


Threading Pages

by RobinsGirlWonder



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Angst, F/M, Gen, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-10
Updated: 2013-03-30
Packaged: 2017-11-25 01:20:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 23,422
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/633578
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RobinsGirlWonder/pseuds/RobinsGirlWonder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Five years after August left Storybrooke for good, he finds himself pulled back into the position of fallen guardian. He's failed her more times than he wants to remember. Can he possibly begin to make up for it now? - ABANDONED (Sorry, I gave up on OUAT a long time ago and the show went too radical a direction to continue)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Devil's Walking Next To Me

**Author's Note:**

> All right, here we go! I've been stewing on this one for a while, trying to narrow down what I wanted to do with it, and I felt this would be a great day to post it! First chapter, I have no set schedule for this one, but something tells me it will quickly take over my Son of a Woodworker muse, and I'm kind of okay with that for a little while. :) If curious, the chapter titles for this fic are all going to be lyrics from Chess's One Night in Bangkok. Take that how you will. Captain! ANGST AHOY! All members of the Wooden Swan ship, to your posts! A storm be a'brewin'! *holds up beer* But, the ship wench promises to deliver your complimentary booze after you're sucker-punched with the angst. Read! Review! Tell others about it! Share! Also, please note that the Son of a Woodworker continuity is considered the same canon as this fic for the most part. Especially my flashbacks about August's time in Phuket.

The smell of sweat, sweet and yet putrid. Days-old laundry, soaked and stained in the pungent odor of bottom-of-the-shelf whiskey and lao khao; mildew and urine and sick.

These were normal for the ungroomed, dirty waste of space huddled up in a corner of a too-small bed in the corner of the too-small hovel. So was the heat, muggy, oppressive, so thick it could be cut with a knife. The floor was littered with dirty needles, broken bottles in atrocious patterns mixed with blood from too many clumsy and impaired accidents, which was also completely normal for the useless man. And the dreams... those were most normal, the most typical and honest of all the things in the small room, where it overlooked Saparn Hin, the sewers of Phuket town.

_I can't trust you._

_I am never going to leave you. I made that promise, it doesn't matter if you're angry with me._

_Angry? I'm not even going to_ _**bother** _ _with being angry. I_ _**expected** _ _this. I am disappointed that you proved me right._

_But, I_ _**didn't** _ _. Why can't you believe me? Emma, I'm telling you the truth -_

_You don't even know what that_ _**is** _ _! Leave. Get out of Storybrooke._

_I can't do that, Emma..._

_Go or I will push you over the town line myself._

A particularly loud shout from the street below chased away the memory. Head pounding, body wracked with pain from too much abuse and no real cure, the fallen guardian stirred from the suffocating cocoon of equally alcohol-soaked sheets. Out of the nightmare of regret that was his dream-world into the nightmare of regret that was his reality. If he ever once deluded himself into thinking he had something to live for, a cause worthy of battle, all he had now to live for was the next fix, the next high. Anything to make him forget.

He slowly, painfully, pulled the sheet off of his head, trying to open bleary eyes. Even with the years of abuse to his body, somehow, there was still that troubled, lonely boy underneath those impossibly blue eyes. He winced and shaded his face with his hand as migraine-inducing sunlight streamed in through his window.

His hands felt stiff, his...  _everything_  felt stiff. One day piled on top of the other, a never-ending fog of inebriation, hustling, and the inevitable fall.  _He finally had strings to hold him down._

There was a time when every movement was for a purpose, had meaning. But now, only low groans peppered with expletives in Thai and English colored his movement as he sat up and glanced at his haggard reflection in the cracked mirror hanging on the wall. He didn't recognize who he saw the reflection's eyes. He was once Pinocchio. He was once someone's angel.

At least, he'd deluded himself into thinking so. For a time.

Like all dreams, that one had to end. He'd been woken up with a cold, hard slap to the face, the abrupt rejection and shame that triggered his most intrinsic response. He hid his loneliness and his shame in the bottom of the bottle, halfway across the world.

The dreams reminded him how he got there. All of it was so familiar, so much of the haze he'd spent ten years in before. How long had it been since he'd seen that little town in Maine?

He leaned forward, knocking aside a few stray pills, picking up his phone, blearily searching for the calendar. His white wife-beater was stained, confining, even if he only wore that and his boxer-briefs.

The same face that greeted him on the phone's home screen every morning was ever-present. The ache was immediate, heart-twisting, stomach-wrenching. Every fiber shuddered, begging for something to dull that heartsickness. He had told himself he'd gone to this island of pleasures and temptations so that he could forget about her. But, he still had the photo he'd snapped of her, bundled in her winter jacket, gloves on, blonde hair tumbling over her shoulders, cheeks pink from the nipping chill.

He couldn't remember when he'd taken it... The memories came and went. It all depended on the day... on the mood...

Another shudder wracked through his body, reminding him that he'd told himself he was trying to forget her. He couldn't do that if he thought about her. He ignored the calendar's day, focusing on the year and doing the math. Five years. Five years since he'd last stepped into Storybrooke. And yet, even in all those years, all the times he'd changed his phone because he'd had to sell it to get the next fix, he'd always saved the SIM card so he could keep that damn picture. Like seeing it was another punishment for his transgressions.

His arm throbbed, begging for something to ease the pain, scratch the itch. He'd spent too long thinking of her. Of what he'd once had. What he let slip right through his fingers...

Standing was a chore - no, an effort of Herculean proportions. His body wanted nothing to do with the rest of the world. It wanted to fall still in the bliss of opium, never to rise again, stiff and unused. Like a puppet in the corner. That was all he was these days anyway.

But, he did manage to stand after all. Stumbling forward, he ignored a sharp pain as his feet crunched over broken glass so he could make it to his leather jacket hanging off the doorknob. Immediately, the need became impossibly strong, consuming him as his fingers searched his pockets for another hit. The second he found what he was seeking out, he stumbled backwards against the wall, sliding down until he hit the welcoming ground. One of the few parts of his room that wasn't completely filthy, that corner was a small haven as he rooted around in his other pockets until he found the tourniquet he kept there.

A bird from somewhere, maybe down the hall, was furiously hitting against something wooden. A distraction...

With the same practiced care that the son of a woodworker had once built locks and threaded pages of an old, worn book, he weaved the latex around his arm and tied it off, looking for a vein. He held the last clean needle of smack in full view and tugged the protective tip cap off with his teeth.

This was the lowest moment. Surrounded in all of the disappointments, all of the things he'd done wrong, he considered what he would do if he shot up too much. No friends, no family... no one cared if he came or went...

He couldn't land the needle in the normal spot. His hands shook, he paused to steady himself, letting out a deep breath. Still no dice. Groaning as pain wracked through, he leaned back as his head bumped the wall, the hand with the needle limp on his leg as he tried to focus.

That bird was louder, just knocking repeatedly against the wooden door of his room.

He couldn't even wreck his life in peace.

"August?" …The bird sounded lower-pitched than he assumed it would. "August  _ **W. Booth!**_ " The bird was taking extra care to say his full name. He tried to steady himself, trying to ignore it. Being a smart-ass wouldn't help him for long. It was probably one of Hawhnā's goons, ready to collect. He'd spent too many days under. He knew he was out of cash, and he couldn't remember the last time he'd stared at cards. " _Pinocchio!_ "

Not one of Hawhnā's goons.

Ungainly to say the least, the waste of space pulled himself to his feet, setting the needle on his nightstand. He stumbled forward as the pounding continued, sounds of a name he hadn't answered to in...  _so many years_ echoing in his mind. He finally reached for the doorknob, unlocking it and slowly pulling it open, stumbling back as he did so.

He blinked, trying to focus on the tall, lanky person in front of him. A mop of brown hair, dark blue jeans, a T-shirt that seemed too big on the frame, he thought he was looking at a teenager.

"August... it  _is_  you." The voice was deep, it didn't ring a bell. He scowled as his body shook with another wave of craving. He didn't have time for someone from his past,  _especially_  Storybrooke. Didn't this asshole know the depths August had crawled into so he could forget that place? Immediately, threads of memory tied together, trying to remind him of what he left behind, what he'd ruined.

He pushed it away as he stumbled away from the door, back towards his bed. "I don't know you..." He grumbled as he staggered over to his bed. "I don't want to know you. However you know that name, forget it quickly and get out of here." A shard of glass stabbed at his feet worse than before, and he hissed, collapsing onto his bed with an angry shout.

He groaned as he heard the door close, and instead of relative silence, there was crunching and jingling as the unwelcome guest let himself in, walking around. "Wow." It wasn't an amazed 'wow'. It was definitely an unimpressed and displeased 'wow.' Oh, good. Someone else to judge him...

"You can feel free to leave at  _any_  time..." He breathed, pained, as he tried to pull the glass out of his foot.

"Yeah, I don't think so..." The visitor replied, although he sounded distracted and concerned as he looked around the room. "You live here?"

August laughed softly, falling back on his bed as he gave up on the glass for the moment, his body protesting the lack of juice in every other way it could think. "If you can call it living..." He lolled his head over to the guest, scowling. "Just go. I don't know any Pinocchio. I don't know anyone. Just go..."

"Hey, you have any juice?" The visitor was rooting through the small fridge he had on the other side of his hovel.  _Wait, did this punk come all the way from Storybrooke to steal August's damn junk?_ He pulled free the small carafe of orange juice he saved for screwdrivers. "Never mind, found some."

Even in his haze, that potently painful fog in between highs, he was curious even in spite of himself. He sat up slightly so he could watch the tall, lanky teen - he looked to be a teen anyway - poured himself a glass and downed it. "You mind?" He groused, beginning to wish it really  _was_  one of Hawhnā's goons.

"Nope." The brunette licked his lips and glanced over at August with a piercing, serious expression. He was debating something, it seemed. Those eyes, a mix of sea-green and a grey-blue, were oddly familiar to August, but he didn't  _want_  to think about why. It was better if he just stayed here and made sure next hit was his last. "You need to get dressed. We need to get going."

August blinked stupidly. "Excuse me?"

"You need to come home with me." It was matter-of-fact, simple, almost like a kid's logic. Last time he'd heard someone talk like that was... "You told me once why you were in Storybrooke. You said you were a believer. But more importantly," The visitor stepped forward, and as August put the pieces together, that fog was parted by cold, icy fear and shame, guilt, all raw, all new again.  _No... it couldn't be... Not him... You weren't supposed to see me like this..._ "You were there for my  _ **mom.**_ " August's eyes widened, he wrapped his arms around himself. "You need to pull yourself together, August." The visitor walked closer. "My mom needs you. Storybrooke needs you. Everyone needs you." He reached out, setting his hands on August's shoulders.

"It's me, August. It's Henry."


	2. The Bars Are Temples But the Pearls Ain't Free

It had taken the better part of a half hour for August to calm his nerves, to recognize that what was happening was, in fact, reality, and not a bad trip from a laced hit of smack. He should have recognized that it was real as soon as he'd seen that smirk across Henry's face. He'd stared that smirk in the mirror for ages before he'd left. Henry had been the closest thing he'd ever had to a son or a little brother and he'd always told himself... when he had left, it was because he knew he never wanted to be found.  _Least of all by him._

And yet, he was there. Somehow, he'd talked August down from a panic attack almost as severe as that same morning so long ago, when he'd felt the shooting pain of his leg turning to wood. To think, August had expected to have turned back to wood long ago, but thanks to his stupid hero complex years ago... he didn't work that way anymore. Magic or no magic, his "default" was set to bone, not bark.

Once Henry had finally calmed him, reassuring him with that same matter-of-fact tone he'd had since a child, he had coaxed August to go take a shower and wash up. And he'd done so gladly, if only for the momentary distraction from the tall drink of water standing in his sardine-can-sized slummy studio.

If there was one blessing that five years of inebriation and illicit drug usage had given him, it was that now he was in too much pain from the lack of a fix to really let any questions about what Henry Mills was doing in Phuket filter into his head. His head was throbbing under the tepid spray of water that felt just as muggy as the island itself. All he could feel was the deadhead, the violent tremors that wracked his body while he tried to simply clutch the soap he was using to scrub his abused body. He was nothing like the man that kid had looked up to for a hot minute.

He wasn't August W. Booth. He wasn't Pinocchio. He was just a wasted addict who was really good with sharking rubes.

He rolled his head, lolling and letting his neck stretch out as he felt a wave of anxiety rush through him. Paranoia followed. What if this wasn't Henry? What if Hahnwa had sent some con artist - no, no, no, they couldn't have known about Pinocchio. Stronger paranoia as he felt his heart begin to race unnaturally. Maybe they knew about Henry and they'd sent him... oh god, what if Hahnwa knew Henry was here? What would he do to that poor kid? He was as young as August was when he got out of the system? The thought of that kid strung out on smack and booze -

August gasped audibly, the noise scaring him right out of that train of thought. Okay, he was jonesing worse than he thought. Fuck, how long had he been under this time? He knew he'd been gone too long when he'd just about run out, but, the symptoms, he knew withdrawal all too well. The fickle bitch.

The worst part about his vice was knowing he couldn't live without it. Oh, he knew the symptoms of a withdrawal. He knew them as intimately as he knew every curve and slope of Emma's body, and yet as clinically as a textbook he'd memorized. Only, the knowledge had not been stored in his mind, but rather in every nerve ending, ever blood vessel, every vein that had tried to calcify from too many hits, only to recover through a quirk in his body. Ever the Wooden Man, yet ever the real boy. In all the ways that hurt the worst.

Stiff, sore, still trembling, he threw his hand out, shutting off the faucet before he stood there another minute. This wasn't going to work. He couldn't be here. August couldn't do this, he couldn't be the man he'd wanted to be for the boy.

He'd already failed Henry when he was a child. His thoughts immediately went back to that day when Henry had come to see him, when he'd showed him the wooden arm and explained who he was. No man wanted to be proven right by having to show just how far they'd fallen. He hadn't wanted Henry to see him like this. He couldn't.

Henry had to go. August was no hero.

August reached out blindly for a towel as he stepped back onto the tile in his tiny half-bath. Wrapping it around himself, he stumbled back into his bedroom, bleary-eyed, a wave of nausea raging up out of nowhere. For a split-second, all he could see was that his floor was substantially cleaner - no, it was just that the broken glass and needles had been pushed into various corners by a broom.

Henry, taller than August and yet somehow so calm, stood leaning against the doorway to the bathroom, holding a change of clothes out to him. "Here. I think this is the only clean thing you have."

A glare was all Henry received in return, mistrusting, wary, angry and defensive. August took the clothes offered, though, and walked over to his bed. He pulled on the boxers provided, then tossed the towel as he took a seat. No sooner than he'd settled on the cushion, he felt the muscle cramps attack his abdomen like a punch to the gut, and August hunched over, trying to breathe through it. He'd waited so long... he'd slept too late that morning. If he'd just gotten his hit two seconds before Henry had come in, everything would be fine, he'd be numb -

"Here. Drink this." Henry's weight settled on the bed next to him, and August glanced up to see a glass of water in his line of sight. "It'll help."

Help.

August reached out, smacking the glass away with such force it shattered against the front door to his place, pain protesting the movement at every turn. "You wanna help, then fucking give me my  _smack._ " The words were foreign, nothing like the man Henry had known. August was so different when he was under the influence, he was no good to anyone. If Emma knew how he'd just smacked at her son -  _Oh, god, Emma._ The heartsickness wracked through him just as it washed over him that he'd just smacked Henry's _hand._   _Oh my god, that's_ _ **Henry**_.

August immediately sat up, a sharp intake of air following him as he looked to the man next to him. "Henry, oh, god, I'm so sorry, I just..." He was  _shit_  at apologies after five years not making them sincerely.

Henry didn't even seem fazed. "It's fine. Quit apologizing." The younger boy reached over, patting August on his back. No more words, though. The boy just stood and walked over to August's jacket. Immediately, the itch started to plague the older man. "You know, you should be utterly wrecked, August." Henry said easily as he fished out the same syringe that August thought he'd left on the nightstand. The way his blue eyes flickered between Henry's hand and the nightstand made that connection obvious. "But, jeez. A quick shower and you don't look any different than the last time I saw you." A smile followed, showing the boy in the man. "That's good. That's... I can't tell you how good that is. It's a sign. We still have time to get you cleaned up."

"Cleaned up?" August shot back, the words sounding like poison. He didn't want to be clean, he wanted his goddamn fix.

"It took me almost a month to find you. You wouldn't believe the hoops we had to jump through, but eventually, I figured that when your bike was stashed in that storage shed in Phoenix that it must have had to do with where you'd stashed mom's bug back when she went to jail. So, we followed the crumbs that suggested you'd probably be in Phuket. Cause, y'know, history."

August's brow furrowed at the new information, but his eyes were still locked on that syringe in Henry's hand. "How do you know all that?"

"Long story, I'll tell you once we get you all buttoned up." Henry grinned, walking over to August and standing in front of him, a hand on his shoulder again. "I promise I'm gonna get you back into fighting shape, August. Because me, my mom, Storybrooke, everyone needs you."

August reached up, scrubbing his face with his hand as his head throbbed and he found himself wishing for that drink of water suddenly.  _Fuck._  "Yeah, you said that. But... Henry..." He glanced up at him. "I don't even know what you're talking about. This is me. I'm... I can't help anyone. You don't know what I've done here."

There was a long pause. For a moment, August thought he'd won the argument, that Henry understood how foolish it was to try to pull him out of this grave he'd dug for himself. "Well, I guess then it's a good thing I'm here." He held the syringe up to August. "Because you don't need  _this_  anymore."

Before August could protest, he watched in horror as Henry pulled back and hurled the syringe right out his open window. August whirled, following the throw just as he heard it plunk into the sewer below.

Bile rose in his throat, rage followed. He glanced back, ready to lash out, but the look on Henry's face... he stopped. He thought he was  _helping_.

"You helped me get my mom to believe." Henry's smile was different, so hopeful it made August's anger melt away to guilt and affection for this kid that he'd honestly hoped he could influence for the better. "Now it's my turn to help you."

August didn't have the heart to remind him that he had sucked at helping Henry's mom. If August was Henry's role model...

This was about to be rough.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you liked it, please! Leave me kudos, leave me reviews, but most of all, please come back for the next chapter, so follow this story or me!


	3. Talkin' To A Tourist

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi, guys! Next chapter here! I'm quite thrilled with this one. I think if I went back and did it again, I probably would have combined chapters 1 and 2 together, methinks, but, ah well. You live, you learn. That being said, I hope this one delivers! I absolutely loved writing this, as OMG, HENRY/AUGUST FAMILY FEELS. Writing it from Henry's perspective was so different for me, as it became quite apparent how Henry is in my head when he's older, and I quite love it. Enjoy! Read! Review! Share! Leave kudos!

Henry was an optimist. It was his nature, through and through. To be completely fair, though, his childhood had been mainly spent living in a town where fairy tales were real and his adopted mom was the Evil Queen, and yet, he'd turned out just fine. Pretty chipper, actually. And more than okay.

On top of that, Henry had a knack for finding heroes. At least, he thought so. After 7 years of all this magical insanity, he'd picked up quite a few friends and allies, and not just because of his family. Henry trusted the right people, more often than not. And even when he trusted the wrong people, it was most often because they had something inside, something that made Henry think that that person just needed a little nudge. And once a person had that trust, Henry clung to it.

And that was exactly why August leaving had been so difficult for him.

Even if it had been five years, Henry had never forgotten August. August was  _Pinocchio_ , the first person to truly, unequivocally believe in Henry, believe that the curse was real. Sure, it was because he had first-hand knowledge of that, but even before then, August had  _never_  talked down to Henry. He'd treated him like an equal. Henry had taken that to heart. Even when August had become a puppet for a while there, he'd been the first person encouraging (there might've been some yelling) his mom to help fix him. Later, August had saved Henry more than once, and when it all went to hell... Henry had been  _so sure_  the guy that Henry felt like was more of a father to him than his own biological dad would've made it out okay.

Henry had begged August not to leave, but his mind had been made up. His mom had told him to leave, no room for debate. So he had.

Henry had had all sorts of heroes in his life. His grandfather, his grandmother, his  _mother_... but they couldn't help now. And even if things hadn't happened  _this_  way, Henry knew that his mom would have always needed August.

It was why him leaving had been so tough for her.

And yet, here he was. In Phuket.

At 17, instead of studying for his SATs, Henry was standing in a dingy, slummy room while he watched his hero, the one he knew was there, deep-down, writhe and convulse from another day of withdrawal.

Maybe it was serendipity that Henry had met some more colorful characters, had seen what addiction could do to people, and therefore, he felt more than prepared to handle whatever August was suffering through. Sure, it was a bit of his ego talking, but, he wanted to think he had learned all the right lessons from the extended family he'd had over the years.

He could do this. He could be the hero, and he could get August back on his feet.

Well, at least the one that wasn't wooden.

It had actually worried Henry far more than he let on when he first walked into August's room two weeks ago. If the drug paraphernalia and broken bottles of liquor hadn't spoken volumes, the fact that August seemed totally complacent and oblivious to the fact that his right leg was wooden from the knee down had told Henry enough.

Someone he had thought of like a father for a long time had given up. Again. And it was up to Henry to pull him back up.

To say those two weeks had been "rough" would have been a massive understatement.

The withdrawal was beyond difficult to watch, but Henry knew it was necessary. There were the shakes, the sweats, the sobbing into pillows while August laid wracked with pain, but Henry never flinched, never showed a sign of weakness. It would've made his grandfather  _very_  upset if he thought Henry couldn't give the strength and support August needed. At least, Henry thought so.

Instead, he sat beside him sometimes, coaxing him to drink as much clean water as he could get him to swallow, so he could try to kick the dehydration the drugs had left him with. Other times, he left for a couple of moments while August wasn't paying attention to him, only to return with food. August never asked how Henry got it, why it had happened so quickly, but soon, the days went from August screaming angrily for smack to sobbing from the pain, to paranoid ravings that Henry was really just there to steal his drugs and really, if he wanted them, he could have them, just put August out of his misery for hurting Emma.

But, through it all, Henry didn't buck him. If he wanted to verbally beat himself up, he let him. He only stopped August the few times he knew he'd tried to hurt himself. And there was one time when August tried to smack Henry away, but, it was certainly not the worst he'd ever seen someone do under the influence of withdrawal symptoms.

What hurt Henry was knowing why August had done all of this to himself, and knowing that August was going to be the one who would be most upset when he finally tore free of the embrace of opiates. Henry could only help August get past the substance abuse. He couldn't make the man forgive himself.

But, as the end of two weeks ticked by, Henry knew he was out of time. They couldn't wait in Phuket any longer. He  _had_  to get August back to the US, and he  _had_  to get August back to his mother. She was running out of time... if it wasn't too late already.

The morning of Henry and August's 14th day in the middle of withdrawal hell, Henry woke August early, ushering him into the shower before he could do more than snark that he wasn't awake yet and "the hell do you mean we're going somewhere, do I look like I want to go anywhere?"

While August showered, Henry busied himself with doing what he'd been covertly doing every day for the last two weeks: cleaning up and packing August's things. Not that he had much. He was very aware that August's custom Harley Classic was still in a storage unit in Phoenix. So, that left August's small bag he'd probably arrived with five years ago, a smattering of clothing that had clearly been purchased, used and abused solely in Patong or Phuket town, and little things, like his wallet and the keys he'd kept. Just in fishing through August's things, it had become crystal clear to Henry that his... step-dad, for lack of a better term, had been subsisting off of hustling for everything he needed.

That was something. At least it meant August still knew how to spin a tale, and Henry would need the guy's very glib tongue for what was ahead of them.

The shower shut off in the next room, and a few minutes later, August came out in boxers and a T-shirt. Unlike the last two weeks, though, Henry had a pair of jeans in his hand, which he tossed at the older man in front of him. "Get dressed. I'm starving." August had barely managed to catch them, but now he was staring at Henry with a more measured, cool skepticism that he'd seen before. Henry couldn't stifle a smile.  _There_  was the August he knew.

"I fail to see why that means I need pants." August remarked, but immediately paused when he must have played those words back in his mind. "Forget I said that." Ignoring the wooden thunk of his leg on the floor, he made it to the bed and sat, pulling on the jeans while Henry waited. Once he'd finally pulled them on, Henry walked over, holding his hand out in an offer to help him up. August waved his hand away and pulled himself to his feet. "You don't have to treat me like I'm an invalid, kid." There was a moment where he wavered as he stood, and Henry wondered if he'd have to prove the man wrong. Thankfully, his balance took over and he let out a deep breath.

Oh good. Because, this was going to get more difficult if he was constantly having to bolster August physically  _and_  mentally. He needed August to feel like the hero here. He needed August to have the confidence that he could do what he had for his mother those years ago, what he'd done for  _Storybrooke._  It wasn't just his mother Henry was concerned for. It was everyone.

"So, I'm starving, and I've had to bring you food for two weeks straight. Let's go get you some air and go pick up some actual food." The twinkling in Henry's eyes was definitely mischief, but August seemed to miss it entirely.

"Henry, I don't think that's a good idea -"

Henry grinned, wrapping an arm around August's shoulders. That experience alone still thrilled him to no end, knowing he was finally as tall as August. He didn't need to get down on his level anymore. They were equals. "Well, either you go with me, or I'm going to go down and talk to the street vendors myself. There's this lady that makes those little coconut pancake balls, and she charges 100 baht -"

"Woah, woah, woah,  _100 baht?_ " August pulled back, confusion, surprise, and a number of other emotions all over his face. "Henry, don't you know how street food works?"

Henry played innocent. "Like anything else, right?"

August sighed, and suddenly, Henry was being pushed towards the door. "All right, kid. That's it. Lesson one about Thailand - you  _haggle_."

Five minutes later, and it was like the August Henry had come to know and love was back in business. Even with the slight limp from his leg having turned to wood, August was strolling through the streets of Phuket town with ease and comfort. Without asking, Henry had a feeling he knew why. In Storybrooke, that would have been a point of shame for August, but here? Here, Henry saw people worse off every day. Honestly, if August had told him that he was more ashamed of the drugs than the leg, he would have believed him.

"Do you have anything in particular you're hungry for?" August inquired as they reached the main street, where lines of food carts were set up on either side of the road. It had amazed him how, while Phuket had seemed like such a faraway, exotic locale when he was regaled with tales as a child, it really looked like any other city. Same cars, same roads, it was all just colored and styled differently.

As the two of them passed an alleyway, Henry felt eyes on the back of his head as he turned to reply to August. "Coconut pancakes. Oh! And crepes, they have those filled crepes here." Henry figured playing to the touristy safe foods would give August the opportunity to exercise his ability to hustle without really getting them into  _too_  much trouble. He had heard August mention someone called Hawhna, who apparently ran the underground gambling and drug circuit, but he'd steered clear. Hence the breakfast walk. They  _had_  to convince August to leave _today._  Every hour spent half-way across the world meant less time to undo the damage that had been done.

"Henry. I am not getting you crepes." August remarked coolly as he took the younger man's arm by the elbow and steered him across the street where they could cross. Henry noted that they were quickly steering towards local food, and he shot a glance over his shoulder to see if he could find those eyes that he knew were watching him. No dice. Huh. "C'mon. Watch a master at work, and I will show you how it's done."

Henry hated that he wasn't really able to give the experience his full attention. While August sidled up to a street vendor, his rattan baskets propped easily on either side of the bar across his shoulders, Henry was trying to keep that sense of urgency in check. When he had been a kid, he would have leapt at a chance to go with August to Phuket, or really,  _any_  of the places he'd talked about in his travels. He  _wanted_  to enjoy this, but there just wasn't time.

At least Henry could play the part of ignorant tourist quite well. As August bartered, smooth-talked and haggled his way through a bag of some sort of dried barbecue, Henry kept his hands tucked in his pockets and watched.

As he returned with the bag, he opened it and held it out to Henry for the first bite. With a chuckle, he took a piece of... squid or something, and took a bite. "Not bad," He said in the way any asshole 17-year-old would say.

"Not bad?" August sighed, rolling his eyes. "C'mon. Pick out something else, and this time, you're gonna have to pay more attention." Patting Henry on the back, the two of them made another round through the carts.

This was the August he remembered. Cool, easy-going, in the same element where he would tell Henry that he was working on "Stuff". Playful, a smooth operator. He was finally starting to come out of his funk.

By the time they'd reached a third cart, and Henry now had a fried banana in hand as well as the barbecue squid - to be fair, that was probably going to get eaten later - he had all but forgotten what he was doing there. For just a couple of seconds, he'd let himself enjoy the easy banter as he tried to negotiate for the coconut pancakes he'd mentioned before. Every time Henry would pitch a high number, suddenly August would be laughing and scolding him like an old hen, reminding him to go very low, then scale up.

The whole thing was going great up until the woman said something to August in Thai that Henry couldn't make out, and August stopped laughing, looking over at Henry. He replied back to the woman in what Henry imagined was the equivalent of "Are you serious?" and Henry blinked, looking at him with innocent, wide-eyed confusion. Used to work all the time before, right?

August propped his hands on his hips, turning to look at Henry with a more serious, annoyed expression. "Henry, is there something you want to tell me about the coconut pancakes?"

Henry laughed a little at the absurdity of the way he'd phrased the question. Like a kid who had been found with his hand in the cookie jar. "Um... no? They're delicious?"

August reached up to wipe his scruffy jaw with his hand, then chuckled a little. "Well, of that I have no doubt. The funny thing is, this lovely lady here says you've been buying them from her all week for the very reasonable price of 25 baht, on account of your sick father."

Henry suddenly felt his ears getting warm. Okay, so he probably should have avoided the cart that Henry had, in fact, been buying food from. "Well..." Henry waffled, trying not to laugh at how badly he was caught in his deception. "You never asked me if I  _knew_  how to haggle..." Okay, no dice. Henry was laughing now. "I'm sorry! You were excited and having fun, I didn't want to ruin it!"

August groaned and took the offered tray of pancakes the woman was holding out to him with a warm smile. He thanked her, then was walking past Henry back in the direction of his room.

Henry quickly whirled, following after him and trying not to roll his eyes. It couldn't be  _this_  easy to make him backslide, could it? "Oh, c'mon, August, I'm just trying to get you back out in the world!" Henry jogged until he was in front of August, and stopped, cutting him off. He could feel those eyes again. "Seriously. You've been cooped up for two weeks with me, and before that, who knows how long?" August couldn't meet his gaze, but Henry dipped his head to try to catch it again. "August, I need your help, but we don't have a lot of time. I  _need_  you to get your head back in the game, and we don't have another 6 weeks to hope you can kick your habit. You've been clean for two solid weeks, and I just saw you acting like... well,  _you!_ "

August shook his head, blue eyes searching anywhere past Henry they could. "Henry, you don't know what I'm like, the things I've done. I'm  _not_  the same man you knew five years ago - "

"That doesn't matter!" Henry cut him off before he could go down that path. He knew why August thought that, but he was wrong. This had just proven to Henry that somewhere, deep down,  _August W. Booth_ was still there. "Look, whatever you've done, whatever mistakes you've made, everybody makes them. You know that,  _I_  know that. And there was a time when you believed that it didn't matter." Henry hoped that was sinking in.

"Henry..." August sounded like he was losing some of that fight, that reluctance. But, it wasn't enough.

 _I'm so sorry, Marco._ Henry thought before he opened his mouth again. "August, sometimes we make mistakes. The important thing is that you come back and you try to  _fix_ them."

Tense silence fell between the two of them, and Henry felt a weight settle in his stomach that encompassed pretty much all of his guilt and shame. He had  _not_  wanted to use August's own father's words against him, but if Marco knew what exactly was keeping his son away from Storybrooke...

"Fine."

Henry blinked, glancing up at August, tearing himself out of his reverie. "Fine?"

"If something is wrong... I will go back." August sounded heavy, a little uncertain, but Henry could guess why. At least now August was back on his feet within reason. "But... they're not going to let me back into the US if I look like I'm death warmed over. And Hawnha's not going to let me leave via the airport."

"But, you're willing to go?" Henry needed confirmation, and when August nodded, he smiled, a sigh of utter relief leaving him. "Okay. Then... you don't have to worry about how we'll get you out of here."

"Again. We?" Henry faltered at August's quick observation. Well, no use hiding it now. He'd just gotten August to agree.

"C'mon, you didn't think I did all this alone, did you?" Henry smiled and turned, looking for those eyes he could feel again. "I think it's safe for you to come out now."

A ginger around Henry's age stepped out of an alleyway just a few feet from them, his hands tucked into his green jeans, a forest green T-shirt matching the startling green eyes the boy had. Good. This was good. They could move forward.

Henry's heart sank as he glanced back at August, who looked less than thrilled.

"Peter."

Oh, great. So, August  _hadn't_  forgotten about Henry's misadventure in Neverland.


	4. Can't Be Too Careful with Your Company

"What are you  _doing_  here - Henry, what is he doing here?"

"Oh, go suck an egg, birch-butt, you haven't seen me in years and that's the welcome I get?"

Oh, this was not how Henry had hoped this part of the conversation would go. His optimism was about all he had left, given the emergency back home, and he had really,  _truly_  wished August would have put the grudge aside by now. Clearly, that was not the case, and Henry was kicking himself trying to think of how to stop the fight that was brewing. "August..." Henry began, only for August's attention to turn fully on him with anger in those cold blue eyes that made Henry suddenly feel very small and very in trouble.

"No, Henry, whatever you have to say, I don't want to hear it!" Oh, no. Henry tried not to bristle, but it was difficult when the equivalent of the only fatherly voice Henry'd heard for a few years of his childhood (Grandpa excluded) had switched to scolding him. Henry had hoped August would trust him, that he would see Henry had a plan and that August could be proud of the man he was becoming. He wasn't so sure that applied right now...

"Here we go..." Peter rolled his eyes, and in that moment, Henry closed his eyes, biting back the urge to slug his closest friend. This was not helping. He steeled himself, opened his eyes and prepared to tell Peter to let him handle it, but that didn't get very far.

"Henry, this little  _shit_  - " August jabbed his finger in Peter's direction as he kept his gaze locked on Henry. "Scared the daylights out of your mother, out of  _me!_  Don't you remember what it took us to get you to finally come back down to earth, Henry? And you're  _still_  traipsing around with him?"

"Hey,  _look_ , just because you found the first habit you could and crawled back into it again, Jackass, doesn't mean I did."  _Oh, for crying out loud, Peter you're not helping..._ Henry had to nip this in the bud. Now.

So, naturally, he employed one of many tactics his mother had imparted to him over the years. "Okay,  _knock it off, both of you!_ " Henry shouted in a tone that was eerily similar to his own mother's 'shut the hell up or I will cuff you to the dinner table to eat' voice.

The crowded market street didn't even seem to notice the commotion, it did the trick.

August blinked and tilted his head, as if impressed. It was a gesture that reminded Henry so much of the hero he'd worshipped... Peter, on the other hand, was only begrudgingly keeping his mouth shut. That Henry knew all too well.

"August..." He began, cautiously hoping that he would just let it go for now. "Peter is not the same as when you met him. I remember what happened. I know why you're upset with him, but it was  _his_  choice to come here. He wanted to help you, too." Henry and Peter had spent several conversations in their search for the missing August W. Booth discussing Peter's motives. They were benevolent, and repentant.

"I've heard that line before." August said, unconvinced, turning his attention back to Peter. "I think we both remember how you 'help' jackasses, Peter." The older man had propped his hands on his hips, and in that moment, Henry was reminded that while August and Peter seemed to be a few decades apart, Peter was actually the much older soul. Peter uncrossed his arms, standing taller, even if he didn't quite reach August's height.

"If you think I need a lecture on my past actions from the wooden boy who ditched his father for Pleasure Island and laughed at my offer to take him to Neverland so he didn't get turned into a braying  _donkey_ ," Peter's voice was low, lethal, years of animosity between the two men only amplified by the distance and alienation. "Then I suggest you go find another needle and dig in, tough guy. Contrary to popular belief, I didn't come here to ruin your day."

"So why  _did_  you come?" August retorted, his voice matching the tone. It wasn't machismo, this was... something else. Henry didn't want to risk letting it continue for too much longer, but he was also concerned as to what August's reaction would be if he broke it up. He couldn't afford another day in Phuket trying to convince August to go.

"Because I know what addiction feels like, and I want to help."

" _Peter!" At only twelve years old, Henry knew he was probably not big enough to be handling this, but he wasn't about to give up now. He'd only had a small dose of Pixie dust, and his memories of Neverland were wonderful and_ _ **terrible**_ _and awe-inspiring. But, he was back to being himself now. He was back in Storybrooke, and he was sitting in his room trying to get back to having a normal life._

_Unfortunately, a boy who had easily become his best friend, was having a more difficult time adjusting._

" _No... no, I have to fly, Henry, I have to fly..." Peter was babbling as he stumbled past Henry's bed in his mother's loft, scrambling and clawing at the window. They'd put in locks on the outside a few nights ago after he'd tried to climb out last time, but this was getting worse by the second. "Tink... she's calling me -_ _ **Tink!**_ _"_

" _No, Peter!" Henry scrambled, managing to get his arms around Peter's waist and tug him back away from the door, hugging him in the biggest bear hug that twelve-year-old could. "You can't fly anymore, remember? Tink's gone, the pixie dust, it's all gone, you can't do it anymore."_

" _But, Tink..." Peter was crying, emotions and regret spilling over his features as he shivered against the boy who had taken him from his youthful paradise. "She needs me... Henry, I can hear her..."_

" _She's_ _ **gone**_ _, Peter... " Henry hugged him more as he heard his mother calling his name in the other room, most likely because of the racket. "You told her to leave, Peter. You said you were going to grow up."_

Henry blinked the memory away. "Can we just go? Just because Peter's here doesn't mean that there isn't a real problem back home. August,  _please_. Peter's telling the truth." A lop-sided, hopeful grin spread across his features, colored by the sadness and concern for his family, both immediate and extended.

If he had been dealing with the August of two weeks ago, or maybe even two days ago, before he'd had two particularly positive days with less of his withdrawal symptoms than before, Henry would have lost that plea. He knew that. But, he  _had_  to hope that August wouldn't judge Peter by his past actions, not when he knew that it was the one thing that had happened to August all his life.

"I don't like this." August grumbled, looking from Peter to Henry once more. "But... I'm not going to stay here if there's something wrong with Storybrooke. With..." August trailed off, and was suddenly walking back towards his building back down the street. Oh, Henry knew that look. That was the look that had haunted August's face for the last two weeks every time he looked at Henry, and every time "Emma" or "my mom" came up in a conversation.

"So, you're going?" Henry asked, his voice pitching up slightly in hope, a hint of the boy he used to be.

August turned, walking backwards slowly, ungainly thanks to his limp, but attentive to both of them nonetheless. "I'll go as far as Bangkok. How you plan on getting us out of the country, I don't know."

The beam on Henry's face was impossible to keep suppressed, even when Peter smacked him on the shoulder with a sigh. "Thanks, Henry. I am  _so_  glad I agreed to wipe this guy's ass." Henry shot him a dirty look. "Metaphorically." Another sigh. "You sure he can help her?"

Henry's voice was soft, thoughtful as he watched Peter walk away. "He'll help anyone. Even when they don't want it..."

_The clocktower stuck midnight._

" _Pssst. Ca-caw! Ca-caw!" The bird call sounded above the rooftops from where the Lost Boy perched on the clocktower. This place felt familiar, but he didn't think about it. Happy thoughts, the happy thoughts of the wind on his face, the sounds of mermaids laughing, and he was off, flying once more._

_He soared over this little sleepy town in a place he vaguely remembered as Maine and paused as a flash of pixie passed his view. Laughing, he turned his attention to it. "Hey, Tink! Did you hear that? He gave the call! I'm gonna go explore, you wanna come with?"_

_Tink flashed out without so much as a 'No, thank you,' off in the direction of the bird call. Most likely, Peter would already be off and checking the place out. No worries! He'd talk to him later, tell him all the discoveries he made, and maybe there'd be_ _**pirates!** _

_Between houses he weaved, glancing through every window he could. All of the ones he passed were closed... except for one._

_His eyes lit up with a mischief, curiosity and pixie dust. He couldn't help himself. He darted inside and landed in the room with grin, hands propped on his hips just like Peter._

_He marched around, pleased as punch, checking out the various gadgets and gizmos in the little room. It seemed to open to a larger one, but that didn't really get his attention. But, there was_ _**one** _ _thing._

_He crouched down a little lower and crept to the bed, scrambling up onto it like a cat on the hunt. His hands settled on the object of his curiosity, and he opened it smoothly. Gasping softly, he grinned and tilted his head as he scanned the pictures. This was... familiar. He knew this book. He knew this place..._

" _Henry?"_

_The voice gave him pause, and he turned, blinking stupidly, not sure why he suddenly felt like crying. Lost Boys didn't_ _**cry.** _ _Girls cried. He was no girl._

_She was beautiful. Long tresses of curly blonde hair that spilled down her shoulders, big eyes that were filled with concern, she was..._

" _Are you Mother?" He asked quietly, not sure why that hurt so much to say it. "Peter says Mothers are beautiful." His vision was getting blurry. Why were his cheeks warm? That didn't make_ _ **any**_ _sense. He stepped closer and closer still, his heart pounding in his chest as he tried to work through all these emotions bubbling to the surface._

_She opened her mouth, ready to speak. Was she going to come to Neverland? Maybe she could be a Wendy! "August. Do it now." The window shut behind him with a swift thunk._

_**Pirate!** _ _**No!** _

_Strong arms wrapped around his waist, pinning his arms to his sides._

" _NO!" He shouted, kicking his feet, trying to take off and unable to lift off with the additional weight of the large person shouting this name, 'Henry', over and over again. "No, lemme GO!_ _ **I'm a Lost Boy! Let me go! Peter! Ca-caw! Lost boys! Help! Lost boys!**_ _"_

A particularly nasty bump on the train tracks woke Henry up from his nap, and he sat up quickly, trying to get his bearing back. August was sitting across from him, staring out the window, and Peter was... somewhere. Henry yawned, glancing around for his friend just in time to see the ginger's head pop up a few rows away. A feminine giggle made him roll his eyes and sit back up. Leave it to Peter Pan to be the biggest flirt in the world.

The train conductor announced that the next stop was Latkrabang SARL Station , which stopped a few blocks from the airport. That reminded Henry, he needed to make a phone call...

"Sleep well?" August's voice caught his attention, and Henry turned to face him. He seemed in much better spirits compared to his sour mood getting on the train, but... well, it still wasn't the same old August. He'd only been seeing glimpses of him before, and now, with Peter on the train, he was afraid he wouldn't see him at all. He had to hope that when they got back to the States...

"Yeah..." He forced a smile as he sat up and shifted.

August gave him an appraising look, one Henry knew all too well. That was the 'I'm concerned but since you're a kid, I'm gonna act like it's a casual question' thing he'd been trying since Henry was ten. "Henry, I think it's time you start being honest with me. No more hints of whatever's waiting out there. I need you to tell me what's happened."

Henry really had not wanted to have this conversation on the train, of all places. He wasn't even sure where to start. Would he be angry if he knew how long it had been happening before Henry finally went searching for him? His mouth was dry, his words seemed to be stuck in his throat now as well.

His phone buzzed. Henry's phone buzzed in his pocket, and suddenly, he had a convenient distraction. "Um..." He tore his eyes away from August and lifted his hips so he could fish the simple international phone out of his pocket.

_Are you here?_  - _B_

Henry glanced up again as they heard the train's horn sound. "Sorry, August. I'll have to explain on the plane." He stood, typing back a quick response " _2 min out. Meet at hanger"_  and grabbed his duffel bag. He heard another giggle from behind him somewhere and looked back at Peter, who was now flirting with a  _different_  girl. "I'll just..." Henry glanced back at August with a little embarrassed smile. "Extricate Peter, one second..."

Five minutes, four phone numbers (all for Peter, and how he managed to get phone numbers from tourists in Thailand was beyond him), one block of brisk sprinting, and a whole lot of unanswered looks from August later, and the group was on their way to the hanger.

"They're not going to let me leave via the main airport," August groused as he caught up to Henry. The trio continued on their path towards the auxiliary hanger outside of the main runways for the airport, but Henry was certainly listening to August's concerns, even if he was focused on the space ahead of them.

He glanced over at August and smiled that smile, that 'Henry has a plan' smile that had helped spur on Operation Cobra, Operation Scorpion, and many others over the years. "Good thing I got us private transportation."

"You did... I'm sorry, what?" August faltered as his blue eyes looked ahead of them, and with good timing as well.

"Henry! You  _found_  him!" Oh, Henry recognized that heavily accented Hungarian beauty anywhere, even as she shouted from down the street, right at the drive for the hanger. Henry turned and faced the person he  _really_  had to thank for all of this.

Draped in a lovely lavender dress with a large, billowing hat and a perfect white ribbon, with snowy blonde curls that tumbled over her shoulders as well, Henry's breath was taken away all over again. How he'd been lucky enough to get her to help...

"He f-f- oh, he found him!" The stuttering portly gentleman beside her, who looked a bit like Bob Newhart in his golden era wore a pair of blue jeans, a red T-shirt and still had a golf cap upon his head. "Well, look at you go! Is this him?" The pair were marching to meet them, but Henry couldn't be happier. Now that they were  _actually in Bangkok_ , he  _knew_  they'd be able to get August back. Suddenly, everything felt better again.

"Hi, guys! I did, Peter and I found him." Henry said by way of greeting, setting his duffel bag down beside him so he could give and receive hugs.

"Um... Henry?" August's voice made him look back, but that grin still couldn't be wiped off the boy's face. "Who... can you explain what's going on, please?"

"Oh!" The Hungarian gasped, a noise that just made Henry feel stupidly giddy. "How  _rude_  of me. Of course, of course." She stepped past Henry, giving the boy a whiff of her expensive perfume. "I am Bianca, and this?" She quickly motioned to the man behind her, but she was all bubble and class. "This is my fellow ambassador, and my fiance, Bernard. We work for the Rescue Aid Society, and your son contacted us when he wanted to find you. Given the plight, we simply could  _not_  refuse, and we  _had_  to help you. The Society prides itself on charitable works reuniting families, helping people who cannot help themselves, and -  _oh!_ " Bianca had suddenly grabbed August by his shoulders, and kissed him firmly on both of his scuffy cheeks. "This is just  _wonderful!_ "

"I..." August's brain seemed to have stalled. "What?"

"Ah, but this is no place for conversation!" Bianca had begun to babble on again, and at this, Bernard grabbed August's bag from him so that they could continue onto the hanger. "Come now, we must get you back to the United States."

"Um... yeah, that's not so eas-" August began, only for Bianca to wave him off.

"Oh, but  _nonsense_ , we have taken care of all of it. This is a private chartered flight, I have ensured that with my diplomatic immunity, we shall all safely travel from here to Tokyo, and from there, back across the ocean. We have  _no_  time to waste, so we must soldier on!"

Henry laughed softly at the way August seemed to have lost the ability for a witty comeback. He wanted to think that if he'd been a little more on his game, he would have had Miss Bianca wrapped around his little finger. To be fair, though, she had everyone wrapped around hers.

As the group reached the hanger, Bianca was still happily prancing about, ready for the next leg of their journey. When Henry had contacted the Society, he'd been dubious that it had been _real_ , much less that people like Bianca and Bernard would be the ones to answer the call. All the more, Henry had felt that this was an auspicious sign. He was doing the right thing.

"Now, as you can see, we have a wonderful plane that will get us where we need to go..." Bianca opened the small office door and stepped into the hanger, but she'd trailed off before finishing. "Oh, no..." She quietly cooed.

"M-M-Miss Bianca?" Bernard glanced over her shoulder, and judging from his body language, something was wrong. "What?! Where's the plane?"

"Wait, what?" August and Henry both asked at the same time, with the same tilt of their heads. Thankfully, Bianca and Bernard moved inside before they risked bowling them over, but sure enough, even after Henry and August had made their way into the center of the hanger bay... it was empty. No plane.

There was a cough and a groan from a bunch of overturned stop blocks in the corner. "Aii-yee...chihuahua..." The voice groaned unceremoniously. Oh, no.

Henry and August were the first there, quickly pulling blocks away from whoever was buried underneath. Meanwhile, the disembodied voice kept calling with a waver: "Hey, Miss B?" He sounded so punchdrunk, it would've been funny if it hadn't been so worrisome.

" _Wilbur?_ " Bianca gasped, rushing towards them. "Oh, no! Wilbur, what happened to you? Oh, sweet Wilbur, please help him!"

"We're - " August grunted as he finally pulled a stop block away and found an arm, clasping it. "Working on it." Henry reached over to help, and after a moment, they'd pulled an older, also portly man out from under the blocks. His nose was bloodied, his face was clearly going to bruise, and he looked like he'd gone a few rounds with the giant.

"Oh, no! Nonono, no, look, guys, I-I-I don't have anymore money, okay?! I don't have anythin' else I can give to you!"

"Woah, hold up, slow down, buddy," August stepped in before Henry could. "We're not here to take your money. Who did this to you?"

"Yes,  _please_ , Wilbur, what's happened?" Bianca asked from somewhere behind them.

Relief and worry washed over Wilbur's face. "Oh, Miss B! Oh, I am  _so_  sorry, but you're not gonna believe it! There were these guys, y'see, and they said they would hurt you and Bernard if I didn't give 'em the keys, and I wasn't gonna, but then Mao - "

" _Mao_?!" August choked, and Henry watched as his hero's face visibly paled. " _Mao's_  here?"

"But then his buddy Johnny showed up-"

" _Johnny?!_ " August shouted, only for realization to sweep in after. "They followed us. Hawhnā followed us. Oh...  _shit._  Oooh,  _shit._ "

"And they were so scary, and I just thought, 'it's just not worth it', so I gave it to them -"

"But Wilbur! What did you give to them?" Bernard finally reached down, grabbing the pilot by the shoulders.

Wilbur swallowed, then whimpered. "The plane."


	5. One Night In Bangkok

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, guys! Hope you're ready, this one is DOUBLE-LENGTH because I was so angry at the freaking episode Manhattan and how much the whole storyline and the way Emma marginalized August, well... it made me wanna write two chapters into one. So, enjoy! That being said, here's a quick note: Please understand that regardless of what happens in the show, Peter in my fic is Peter Pan and will not be reconciled with whatever canon they throw at us. I really just couldn't get over the fact that they ruined Peter freaking Pan, so this is the version of Peter I wish they'd given us. So yes. Enjoy this. This was SO fun to write and the end sorta killed me, but the whole thing felt AMAZING to write, so I hope you all enjoy it! Please Read, review, share if so inclined! Leave kudos, at the least, if you enjoyed it!

August's mind was racing. He'd completely blocked out the chatter of Henry, Peter, and their fellow compatriots. Instead, he backed away slowly as he tried to piece together the last two weeks, and what had gotten him here. His heart raced in his chest, thudding unpleasantly to match the way his stomach was somersaulting.

Johnny and Mao. Both of them had managed to come to Bangkok and work this guy over, taking the plane. They must have left before he had with the boys, but...

"The marketplace..." He muttered quietly, his electric blue eyes scanning the hanger absently as he kept fitting the puzzle together. They hadn't exactly been quiet, and August was still recovering from the detox. His senses were dull, and he knew they'd been worse the day before. If Johnny had taken the express, or had one of Hawnha's private helicopters...

August scrubbed his face with his hands, trying to put everything in order. It didn't matter how they'd gotten there. What mattered was that they had the plane. Henry, Peter, Bianca and her friends; they'd all just become more chips on the table for Johnny to wager with. He'd dropped them all right in the middle of his problems.  _He'd put Henry and Peter in danger._

First Emma, now Henry. August's stomach writhed as he tried to lock down on the panic assaulting his senses. He should've told Henry to leave the moment he got here. August's pathetic excuse for a life wasn't worth this; it wasn't worth the risk of Johnny or Mao reaching them -

A piercing ring completely threw his thoughts aside and silenced the worried chatter of the group helping the pilot. It took him a second to recognize the sound. Turning, pivoting on his bad leg, he glanced around, trying to locate the cell phone that the noise was coming from. He caught sight of it, a small, black, nondescript mobile phone that vibrated and let out that piercing whine from where it rested on the small utility counter against the hanger wall.

A quick glance back to Henry and the others was obvious. They didn't know where the phone came from, and it didn't seem to belong to anyone.

As August strode towards the counter, he already knew why that weight was sinking into the pit of his stomach. Somehow, even as he picked up the phone and caught a glimpse of "Unknown Number" on the display, he  _knew_  who it was.

His finger hit the Accept button as he shot a furtive glance back towards Henry. "Hello?"

" _Booth. I see you got my message._ " A wash of ice scattered over his body, spilling over his shoulders until it settled in the base of his spine. The barest hint of a shaky breath escaped his mouth as he reached up, dragging the back of his hand against his lips.

"Johnny." August's voice was neutral, but he hardly felt that way. Like some demon in the night, speaking his name had given him power over August once more. How could he have been so  _careless_? Henry had spent two whole weeks with him, and of  _course_ , Johnny would have already known. He was Hawnha's right-hand man. He had probably been watching from the get-go, and anything Peter or Henry had discussed he most likely knew.

" _Oh, good, you do remember me. Funny, I thought maybe you'd forgotten, since you seem to be under the impression you can leave._ " Johnny was playing it cool. Why wouldn't he? He had the keys, he had the plane, and more importantly, he still had a debt over August's head that he could never repay.

"I have to go back, Johnny. There's..." August's heart twisted painfully in his chest as his responsibility smacked him in the face again. Another layer landed on top of everything else he was trying to hold onto. "There's someone who needs me, and I need to handle things with her, but, then I promise I'll be back - "

" _You said that last time. I'm not a stupid man, Booth._ " August grit his teeth. He knew how this had gone last time. His legs broken, ten years lost in smack, women, and booze. Now that he was in the middle of this mess, he was actually disgusted by his own naivete. Had he really thought this would be so easy? " _But, I am not unreasonable, you know._ "

Confusion flickered across his features. From the way Henry and Peter marched over from where Wilbur was getting patched up by Bernard, he must have telegraphed alarm as well. "Whatever it is you have to say, I'd prefer you get to it." Anger leached through, just the slightest tinge to what he hoped sounded fairly diplomatic. "Regardless of what you want with me, the plane's not mine. You need to bring it back."

" _I could possibly do that for you, Booth. But, see, there's that lingering problem of the substantial amount of debt you still owe._ " Johnny's laugh was tinny, raspy, and raked down August's spine, unsettling him. " _I see the plane as collateral._ "

"Let me buy it off you." August blurted. Okay, that hadn't really been a plan in his mind, hell, he didn't  _have_  a plan, but he knew there was only one reason Johnny really kept August around, and that was for the money. If August had lost his ability to shark clientele before now, he would've probably been killed from laced junk.

" _Booth, baby, you don't have that kind of cash -_ "

"Let me play." The words flowed forth without him thinking. The story was spinning, he was planning his next move before he'd even made the first one, but he  _knew_  this could work. "Give me one night-  _tonight_. Okay? Give me the night, and I will raise the money to cover what I owe you  _and_  the plane. I do that, then you give us back the plane and we go on our merry way." There was silence on the other line, a blessing and August knew it. Johnny was considering the offer. "Just tell me how much. I  _promise_  you, it will be a fair deal, and I will fleece every one of your marks tonight."

The seconds that ticked by while he waited threatened to stop his heart. He heard Henry's footsteps come even closer, bridging the gap between them while he silently questioned what was happening. August couldn't bring himself to meet Henry's eyes, knowing that the kid was watching him like a hawk.  _"Fine. I want 250,000 Euros. No less. You bring me that at the end of the night to Loy Faa, and we'll open negotiations. If you aren't there by midnight, consider the deal off."_

The phone beeped, two little blips in a minor key, and the call was over. His hand slowly lowered to hang limply at his side. 250,000 Euros. He didn't have nearly that kind of money. On a good night, he'd bring in 150,000, and that was on a  _really_ good night, an  _unspeakably_  lucky one. He would need a high-roller game, and he didn't think he had that much influence left in the gambling scene in Phuket, much less  _Bangkok._

Unless...

"Okay." August breathed, turning to face everyone as he dusted the cobwebs off of his once-effortless wit. The group was watching him, rapt and tense. Because that wasn't nerve wracking... sure... "I have a plan, but I'm going to need some help."

"Plan to do what? Who were you talking to?" Henry, of course, was the first to ask. Questions that seemed simple to answer, but any follow-up meant they were questions he wasn't prepared to share with Henry. It was bad enough Henry had seen him at his lowest. He couldn't tell him what he'd done to even get there in the first place. If someone else had ever used as much effort destroying their life as August did, he wanted to meet that person. He was 100% positive that he was a special breed of self-destructive.

August instead chose to bypass the notion of follow-up, and reasoned that steamrolling them with tasks would work better. "That is Johnny Enright. He's the one who took the plane. He wants me to stay, and he's not afraid to hurt you guys to get it, so I am not gonna let that happen." August pocketed the phone with ease as his pressed on. "I need to raise 250,000 Euros by midnight, and Johnny will let us have the plane back."

"250,000?" Bianca echoed, her voice quivering with worry and concern. "We might be able to wire the money - "

"Yeah, no offense, Miss Bianca," August sighed, holding his hand up to silence her. "But they're not gonna take a check from the 1st Bank of Bangkok." A wry smile flickered across his features, an attempt to ease the blow that he knew Johnny well enough that this was a trap. Even if he came up with the money, something could go very wrong. But, he wasn't some stupid kid anymore. He'd learned that lesson. An island of pleasures is filled with liars and cheats. "If you can, I'm sure we can buy some of the chips I can't win, but the best bet will be for me to find my way into a high roller club." He turned to Bianca's fellow ambassador, giving him a quick lookover. "Bernard, you look like the kind of guy who can cut a quick dash in a pinch. If I give you names and addresses of the gambling dens around here, can you go scout around and ask the managers if there are any high stakes games that a..." August's eyes mischievously slid over to Bianca. The ruse was forming in his head already. "Wealthy diplomat could be entertained with. Make it clear she doesn't want to play, but that her purse strings are quite loose."

"I..." Bernard fidgeted as he glanced Bianca's way, and August expected some sort of quick reassurance.

"You can do this, Bernard." What he saw in her expression made him pause, his heart aching in a way he hadn't felt in... years. Longing. He remembered that. He wasn't longing for Bianca, but... the look on her face. The implicit  _I trust you with everything_  look he'd just seen...

Once, a long time ago, another blonde had looked at August like that -

 _"I can't trust you._ "  _The disgust rolled off her in waves, each consonant a spit or hiss as an asp going in for the kill. But, he'd expected rage, he_ _ **deserved**_ _rage for what he'd done. Even as he looked at her, his leg throbbing beneath the leg of his jeans, he stumbled forward, towards her where she stood on the street near Granny's diner._

_"I am never going to leave you. I made that promise, it doesn't matter if you're angry with me." He could feel his heart twisting and breaking with every word, but he_ _**meant** _ _it. She_ _**had** _ _to know. He'd made so many mistakes, he just wanted to fix this one._

_"Angry?" Her voice pitched higher as she shook her head, more disgust flowing through. "I'm not even going to_ _**bother** _ _with being angry. I_ _**expected** _ _this." He winced as she reminded him just how badly he'd broken her trust. All because of one lie... with the best of intentions... She stalked towards him, rage that she claimed wasn't there, coming forth in a raw growl. "I am_ _**disappointed** _ _that you proved me right."_

_Silence fell as he tried to collect his thoughts, tried to unravel this mess he'd made. "But, I_ _**didn't.** _ _" He pled, even as her grey eyes were steel, each glower sharply stabbing at his feeble attempts to recover. "Why can't you believe me? Emma, I'm telling you the truth -" A lie. A lie that felt so easy, felt so comfortable, that he knew the moment he spoke it, it had sealed his fate. His leg throbbed more sharply._

_Emma's rage couldn't be bottled any longer, and tears - rage or hurt, he didn't know - spilled over her cheeks. "You don't even know what that_ _**is!** _ _"She caught herself then, before she could say anything else. He could see the way she bit her bottom lip, threatening to make herself bleed just so she wouldn't rake him over coals. After a long moment, Emma drew in a deep breath to steady herself. When she looked at him again... those eyes were truly steel. Tempered, cold. "Leave. Get out of Storybrooke."_

_August felt his knees buckle as she ordered him to do exactly what he knew she would. He had done this to himself... "I can't do that, Emma..." He breathed, hints of the broken boy inside the broken man._

_"_ _**Go.** _ _" The order was finite. It was Princess, Sheriff, Mother and Lover all rolled into one convicted word. August felt those walls go up so fast, he thought he'd run into one of them. His chin shook, he swallowed dryly. His own eyes felt warm, but he couldn't force a word. "Or I will push you over the town line myself."_

As August was pulled back from the last time he'd seen her, the ache had returned with such force that he couldn't speak. Bianca trusted Bernard. Like Emma had once trusted him. Like her son was now trusting him...

He had to stack the deck in his favor here.

"Peter," August turned his attention to the redhead, who gave him more attention and respect than either probably expected. "I need you to find the plane. They couldn't have moved it too far, I bet they only had a few hours on us, and it's not exactly small. Chances are, it's something owned by Hawnha, one of the hangers around here. Scope it out, find it, and by midnight, meet me at Loy Faa. If things go sour, I would appreciate the backup."

"Let me guess, this guy's a pirate and you don't trust him far as you can throw him." Peter replied easily, hands stuffed in his pockets as he surveyed August. "Let's be honest, jackass. You think he'll break his word."

"I'm definitely expecting it." August conceded. "But, if I can raise the capital to get his attention and we know where the plane is -"

"Worse comes to worse, I'll take them with one hand behind my back and we make a run for it." Peter grinned, wide and excited for the notion. All August saw was the troublemaker who lured kids away from Pleasure Island with the promises of eternal freedom from grown-ups. The troublemaker who took those boys away and made them forget who they were. "Sounds like fun." Peter nodded, and turned, beginning an easy stroll back towards the door.

"I'll go with you." Henry's voice was still jostling for August at times - he'd known this kid when he was 11 and 12 - but that wasn't what made him suddenly panic.

August crossed the small distance between them, cutting Henry off from joining Peter. "Woah, wait a second, I said  _Peter_ , not  _Henry._  No, there's no way I'm letting you get in the middle of this." For one thing, his mother would kill him, and for another, August wouldn't be able to live with himself if after everything Henry had tried to do for him, the kid got hurt. "No, absolutely not. You can stay here and help Orville."

"Wilbur!" The pilot groused from where he was now sitting in a fold-out chair, nursing his cut lip and puffed cheek with an ice pack someone must have grabbed while August was on the phone.

"I apologize," August fired back, rolling his eyes. " _Wilbur._ "

"Look, August, I get it, you want to protect me." Henry sounded so nonplussed, that, like usual, August wanted to give the kid a medal. He'd always been like that, though. As long as he knew what was going on, nothing seemed to bother Henry. "But, I'm not a kid, okay? I brought everyone here, and so I am going to pull my weight. I told Bianca and Bernard I would get you out of here in one piece, and I plan on it."

August was momentarily stunned speechless. Henry's tone was eerily similar to his own. Confident, unwavering...  _wanting to prove something_.

A heavy sigh escaped August's lips as he conceded. "Fine, but you two stay together." August turned his attention back to Peter, trying to ignore the way his heart raced as Henry walked over to join him. "Anything happens to him, Pan, and it's on your head."

Peter reached over, slipping an arm around Henry's shoulders in a way that didn't sit well with August. He knew who Peter had been before Storybrooke. He didn't think for a second that he'd changed  _that_  much.

As the two of them slipped back out the front door, August tried to ignore the way his wooden leg throbbed with some phantom, sudden pain. The boys would be fine. They had to be.

In the meantime, he had to focus on how he was going to get everyone out alive.

Bernard left shortly after Peter and Henry, while Bianca and August discussed how much capital she had on hand that she could give him. Forty-five minutes after that, Bernard had returned in a complete flustered tornado of information.

August had a game to play.

* * *

"This guy is a walking mistake waiting to happen, you realize that, right?" Peter's hushed voice broke Henry's focus as the two of them scouted out yet another hanger at the airport. They'd been through three, knew they couldn't get to the major airlines, and so they'd backtracked back towards the regional flights. While Henry certainly loved an adventure as much as Peter, unfortunately, he was too busy having doubts about August that Peter was - admittedly less tactfully - voicing.

"He'll be fine," Henry replied, his tone finite and absolute. He knew August. At least, he knew the man of five years ago, and that man? He had wanted to be better. He had saved Henry's life... he'd saved a lot of people while he was in Storybrooke. But, most of all, he had promised to protect his mother. And Henry knew August could tackle his demons, could get them out of this mess. The last two weeks with him had proven that. He'd been clean, committed, and had started to sound like his old self. Henry didn't want to risk derailing that with his own doubts. Henry was the glass half-full guy. Peter was his local pessimist now that he didn't have pixie dust running through his veins, intoxicating him with euphoria.

"Yeah, I dunno about that, buddy." Peter's eyes scanned their surroundings as they approached the hanger wall. "Five years ago? When he was all piss and vinegar, and I thought he had some big brass ones? Sure. Now?" Peter shook his head and cautiously inched up to the aluminum siding, resting one hand on it as he leaned forward to peer ahead. When he'd checked their path, he turned to face Henry. "Sorry, but you want me to trust him, I need a little more than the lying-liar-who-lies to tell me he has a plan."

Henry rolled his eyes, preparing to speak, but footsteps suddenly sounded against the hard concrete nearby. Peter's calloused hand reached out, tugging him back and pushing him up against the hanger wall. The two of them didn't speak, didn't breathe, they remained plastered with their backs against the wall.

This was not how Henry had hoped this part of the journey would go.

The footsteps turned and faded back the other direction, and the two teens relaxed, letting out the breaths they'd been holding while mirroring each other. Furtive glances, a silent inquiry if the coast was clear. Peter and Henry had been working in tandem for so long, they practically finished each other's sentences.

Of course, that symmetry didn't help them when a different thug rounded the  _other_  corner, spotting the boys just as they turned to face him.

"Shit." They both balked.

" _Doononsi!_ " The stocky Thai cried, effectively sounding the alarm as he turned to look for reinforcements.

"Henry!" Peter moved in the blink of an eye, reaching into his pocket. "Toodles!"

Henry heard the metal ball bearings that Peter always kept on hand clacking against the concrete just as the thug lunged for the youngest of the Charming family. As expected, the goon slipped on the bearings cast underfoot, and Henry swivelled out of the way. With a metallic, hollow  _woooong_ , the guard's head connected with the aluminum siding, and he slumped to the ground with a groan, then went totally limp.

The move, for its obvious namesake, was one of Peter's favorites, and it always brought a crooked smile to the faces of both those boys. Okay, this part of the adventure wasn't so bad.

More footsteps started to converge on their location, and with wide eyes, the two locked gazes, silently agreed, and took off running around the corner down against the hanger wall. It wasn't the first time, and it wouldn't be the last, that the two of them had bitten off more than they could chew.

Thankfully, while Peter was busy bolting forward, Henry caught sight of an office door ahead of them. It led into the hanger, which meant it could mean more guards, or... it could mean safety. "Peter, over there!" The brunette managed a point towards the office door.

Skidding to a halt, Peter tried the door, and with ease, the two of them rushed into the hanger and slammed the door behind them. Henry stole a glance through the small window, and caught sight of the thugs rushing towards the door. "Okay..." He panted, forcing a thick swallow. "Looks like we're gonna have to move..."

"Yeah, that's not gonna be so easy, Henry..." Peter's voice sounded odd.

Henry turned towards him, wondering what the issue was.

Oh.

The guns pointed at them might've had something to do with it.

* * *

The minutes ticked on, each one worse than the last, punctuated by the casual flip of playing cards on the table, the coughs of his fellow players, and the occasional flick of a lighter.

Bernard had done a remarkable job scouting out the dens, and this game was the best of the bunch. The high rollers were all diplomats, rich tourists - he was pretty sure one of them had run for a Senate seat a few years back - and of course, August. Bianca had taken on the role of rich heiress with an icy glare who wanted to watch her "kept man" play. That worked for August on a few levels. First, that meant that the high rollers assumed he would be a horrible player, given that he was essentially doubling as Bianca's escort. And secondly, it meant the high rollers were watching Bianca and trying to lure her into conversation, meaning August was free to work the table.

And boy, had he worked the table.

The pot was sweet, practically overflowing with the notes and bills that had joined from each hand. At first, August's concerns had been solely based on the time: could he sufficiently raise the pot enough  _and_  take it home?

Yeah, those vanished after one hour into play, one of them dropped the keys to his Porsche into the pot as if it was just another bill.

The pot was easily going to take care of the debt to Johnny, but August knew who he really had to thank when this was over. It was Bianca's willingness to put her reputation - and safety, he reminded himself - on the line for this incredibly risky plan that had made the impossible the very likely. The minutes had kept ticking on, and August played the table like a finely crafted instrument, the percussion of cards and everything from casino chips from the other gambling dens to keys to rolls of bills.

But, time was running out. He would have to close the game.

Billy Joel's "That's Not Her Style" played on the radio in the corner while August's eyes drifted from player to player. The senator had folded earlier, as had two others in the hand, and it was down to August and some foreign dignitary from Paris and some Australian gem dealer. As per usual, they ignored him save for an occasional glance to see if he was telegraphing. August's poker face may have sucked around Emma and childhood nightmares like Rumplestiltskin, but in an actual game? He was cool as can be. Especially since he wasn't the one with the purse to lose, that was the woman with her arms wrapped around him.

For the majority of the evening, he'd played with a falsely diminished capacity, with Bianca resting in his lap, one hand tangled in his hair. On  _any other given day_ , he would have really enjoyed having a drop-dead gorgeous frosty blonde on his knee, but given that of all the cons he'd ever run, this one was vital to not just his safety, but everyone else's, he'd forced himself to keep his mind on the pot, and not the slender - and very spoken for - fingers in his brown mop. For a woman who seemed so prim and proper, innocent as pure driven snow, she was either very good at playing the saucy socialite, or maybe she really  _did_  have kept men on the side.

August kept reminding himself that Bernard was in the next room, probably drinking himself under the table from his nerves, but that at the end of the day, Bianca was so in love with that guy that even if August had wanted to, he couldn't have her. Not that he did. Bianca was too good for someone like him.

Her fingers tightened in his scalp in a way that made him shiver quite suddenly, bright eyes glancing up her way to give her some idea that it was not fair to play with his hormones while he was working. A quirk of her eyebrow above one of those meticulously lined cat eyes kept him on track. The silent inquiry was their signal that she felt the pot was high enough that he could take it home.

A fervent glance at the clock proved her right. It was 11:45. He had fifteen minutes to bring the pot home, get to Loy Faa, and make the swap.

He glanced down at his hand, face neutral, no signs of discomfort or nervousness revealed. But, he had a shitty hand.

God, he'd had shitty hands but this was  _the_  shittiest hand he'd ever had. His hand could not have been worse if it had tried. His only card to play would be his highest. He didn't have a flush, he didn't have a straight, he had... the Monstro of games in front of him and here he was, all over again, floating on a raft with a King of Hearts.

_Fuck._

The Aussie called the bet, but there was a way his jaw kept ticking that suggested he wasn't happy with his hand, either. August's attention shifted as he watched the Parisian. He also seemed pretty cool, pretty relaxed, but that didn't mean much. But, he raised.

Okay, so, Aussie felt worried, Parisian felt confident.

August would literally have to bluff his way through his hand and hope to god the Parisian was made of softer stuff than the man who'd been conning marks for over half his life.

Looking over his cards once more, August reached up to take a long drink of his water - which had come from a flask in his jacket pocket, and no one had questioned it - and grabbed the last stack of bills he and Bianca had brought with them.

"I raise 3000." August's voice was steady, calm, confident even. But, inside, he was shivering like a twig on a branch in the middle of a hurricane. If this went bad, they would lose it all. Given by the way Bianca tightened her grip in his hair a little again, she'd noticed it, too. Reaching down under the table, he found her forearm and squeezed it gently, reassuringly. He knew what he was doing. She'd trusted him this far. And she reminded him so much of Emma... It just hardened his resolve, and he felt no guilt levelling that intense stare onto the gem merchant.

It was enough to make the Aussie buckle. "I fold." He grumbled, grabbing the cigar out of his mouth and extinguishing it like he was crushing a roach as he flipped his cards over. He had two pair. He could've taken August with his one high card.

But, that left August and the Parisian.

How many times had he done this with booze and smack running through his veins? August kept his cool, but his mind was falling back to every game he'd lost, every hand he'd failed to secure. And if it didn't go there, it was going to the thrill of the victory, and the bliss that followed. The numbness as he turned over his winnings and Johnny provided him the ounces of heroin he needed so badly just to forget every stabbing pain that tore his heart every time he thought of his life before Phuket.

August's eyes darkened as he considered the possible boon that a pot like this could give him.

"Awfully confident, aren't you?" The Parisian growled as he took a drag from his cigarette. The room was heavy with smoke, enough to make August nervous from his wooden leg straight to his heart. Some things didn't change.

"The Lady wants a new car..." August remarked easily, a slight slur in his voice indicative of being inebriated, even though he wasn't. It had worked before. He played up how drunk he was, giving the impression that he couldn't have hidden the fact that his hand was as useless as a concrete parachute. He'd have to rely on Bianca not to give it away, to remain just as confident, and see if they could quietly bully him down. "And you seem so inclined to give it, that... what the hell?" He shrugged and slipped his arm back around Bianca's waist, tugging her closer, resting his stubbled cheek on the smooth skin of her bicep. It mirrored the actions of far too many games over the years; it was becoming easy for him to get more than a little lost in the farce.

"You're out of anything to bet with." Oh, he had August there. August's gaze never flickered, but the barb had still hit his mark. If he tried to raise, he was screwed. "So I raise you 3200." The increase in the bet was minute enough that it could break the bank for August and Bianca, but it showed the Parisian had very little left to bargain with either. Panic made August's heart race. He had failed. He couldn't raise any further, he didn't have anything else -

"August..." Bianca cooed in a way that sent shivers down his spine. Okay,  _not fair._  Again, she was making it impossible to focus, and with the mixed up way his brain kept drifting back to the past, the whole experience was becoming eerie. With the way she leaned closer, though, and her fingers slid through his hair, he could tell it was a planned motion. He feigned ignorance as her breath drifted against his ear.

Her suggestion garnered a silent 'Are you serious?' Bianca nodded.

And then the gears finished turning. He realized what she was intending to do.  _Genius._

"Miss Bianca has given me permission to raise... with her family home in Budapest." The words sounded all too shit-eating grin to August, but he couldn't help it. The brash display of wealth and confidence was just... god, it was the kind of ballsy maneuver he would've expected from Emma.

August sobered. He waited.

The Parisian balked, sputtered uselessly for a moment. "That's not - that is not a sufficient bet, you don't have the deed or - or - "

"No limits game, sir." August countered, still easy-going, even as the manager stepped into the small, dimly-lit, hazy back room at the news of only two remaining players. "So what's it gonna be? You willing to call or raise? I'm sure you have a Parisian chateau of your own." He let that hang in the air as the manager walked in, taking stock of the situation. A reedy, older and balding gentleman, August had never met him before. He'd left the Bangkok gambling circuit very early on in his time in Thailand, which was most definitely a godsend. If it had been any one of the dens in Phuket, they would have called him out and kicked him out without a satang to his name.

Finally, the Parisian threw his cards down. "Fine! I fold!"

Bianca squeaked happily and stood, grabbing her large clutch as August began to scoop the pot towards himself.

"Wait a moment - " The Parisian grabbed August by the wrist, a move that immediately set every fighting instinct he had on high alert. "You haven't shown your hand."

It was going to be that kind of a night. "You're not gonna like it." August replied smoothly, his voice quiet, reminiscent of conversations about lemurs in Nepal.

"Show me your hand." He snarled once more, and August sighed, slowly laying the cards out in front of him.

Silence fell as the realization that August had clearly bluffed him right into losing the significant pot washed over his face. The manager took note as well, just as the man swore under his breath and reached for August's collar. "You cheating sonuva - "

One thing about a high rolling gambling den: the manager's security was always nearby, even if it didn't feel like it. And the moment his movements became threatening, there was the click of a hammer, someone's handgun pressing into the back of the man's neck, and he went stock-still. August glanced up at the manager, who nodded smoothly and motioned to take the pot.

"Pleasure playing with you, sir. Have a lovely evening." August finished dumping the bills and various winnings into Bianca's purse and the two of them turned to leave.

As they made it back to the lounge, August glanced over at his benefactor with a sidelong grin. "A family home in Budapest? You were willing to sacrifice that?"

Bianca laughed as they turned towards the lounge. "Oh, don't be silly, August. The family home is an old hovel, we moved to Debrecen when I was a child. Now," She smiled and turned to him, a purse full of treasure to turn over. "Let us go and get the plane. You have a family to return to."

August's footsteps faltered as Bianca walked past him, reuniting with Bernard. His heart sank as the stark reality of that set in. They'd done it. They could get the plane back...

He'd have to go back to Storybrooke.

* * *

"So, on a scale of 1 to done, how bad an idea would you say this is? Because, I think this is y'know... on par with that time we tried to capsize the Jolly Roger."

 _Oh, just shut up, Peter._  Henry groaned, leaning back until the back of his head bumped into Peter's ginger mop. The ropes were starting to really wear at his wrists, and he squirmed. "I think this is actually worse than the Jolly Roger," Henry retorted as the two of them sat, tied back to back in plastic fold out chairs as they awaited their fate. Henry stared longingly up at the skylight above them. The two were strapped together somewhere in the Loy Faa Casino, only recognizable by the fact that both Peter and Henry had looked up the location before they went to find the plane. Not that this had done them a lot of good. "Because, see," Henry continued, still resting his head against Peter's while the other guy squirmed, probably trying to get out of the thick cord that wouldn't fray. "Last time, it was Captain Glassjaw's crew of the day versus all the Lost Boys, and it was, like, the third time he'd come back from the dead, and sure, I was  _twelve_ , but at the end of the day..." Henry's gaze drifted from the skylight to the silhouettes of guards that were posted at the one door in or out, seen through a thin curtain that kept Peter and Henry out of view. "They just smelled. They didn't have  _guns._ "

"I dunno, I thought we were doing really well. I just forgot my sword, and I didn't want to make you feel inadequate." Peter quipped, and Henry blinked, his brow furrowing as he felt a weird sensation against his backside.

Henry squirmed again, trying to look back at Peter. "Dude, so not the time..."

"What?" He hissed back, then rolled his eyes and whispered. "Sorry to disappoint you, but I am trying to find my pocket knife, sweetheart."

"We need to have a long discussion about your definition of 'I have everything under control.'" Henry groused before turning to look back at the guards at the door. "Um... hi. Hello." He nodded some, plastering on his Charming family grin, hoping that Charming family grace-and-tact would not follow. Even if they couldn't see it. "Hey, question. I know Johnny said he'd be back soon, but... do you guys have any juice?" No answer save for a disinterested and frustrated look, he imagined. Okay, no dice there. Peter's knuckle jabbed into his hipbone painfully, and Henry bit his lip, forcing himself not to jump a mile and bring even  _more_  attention to themselves. "I'm starting to think I should've left you at home with mom."

"And miss all my sass?" Peter's knuckles kept squirming, then stopped. He must've found what he was looking for. "Admit it, you'd be bored to tears without me." Peter's hand started moving in a decidedly up and down motion, subtle but definitely there. He must've found his knife, which meant they might actually get out after all.

"Yup..." Henry sighed, but with their escape nearly in hand, he couldn't help but let affection bleed through his voice for his best friend, sass and trouble and all. "That's what it is. I keep you so I'm not bored - "

Conversation in the next room cut theirs completely off, Henry still slack jawed as he tried to listen to what was being said. It wasn't in English at first, but... he recognized the voice. That was August. Henry's heart leapt in his chest, so badly he wanted to jump right out of the seat he was physically bound to. If he was there, then he'd  _done it!_  He  _knew_  he could count on him, he _knew it!_

The door opened and the guards stepped aside. "... knew I could count on you to do the right thing, Booth." Johnny stepped into the room, August right behind him, carrying a manilla envelope, presumably full of whatever winnings he'd made.  _Oh, way to go, August. I knew you could do it._ "This'll be more than enough to get you what you want." Henry craned his neck, trying to see anything more than just the outlines of the two men. He could see that August was alone, but it was probably because Bernard and Bianca were poised downstairs, ready to go get Wilbur. It made sense as part of the grand plan, right?

"Yes, I'm aware. Let's just do this, I want to go home." Henry's smile widened at August's voice. He was thinking of Storybrooke as home again? He'd been so busy trying to clean him up for the weeks that it had been easy to lose sight of how distant August seemed. Apparently, they'd made progress.

"Of course. Well, here are the keys to the plane." There was a metallic clink as Henry saw Johnny pull something from his pocket and deposit it on the craps table. "But, before you walk away, you know I'm a man of my word, Booth." Henry strained against the ropes again while Peter kept sawing, catching sight of Johnny reaching across the table. "You realize with how much you've brought, you haven't just paid off your debt... I could give you enough smack so you never have to ask me for another thing again." Henry froze. What? He wouldn't... Johnny chuckled. "It's cute, the way your eyes dart and your fingers twitch, I can see you jonesing, Boothy. And I'm not cruel, you and your juice can just walk out of here, happy as you please, and before you know it, you'd forget everything that ever hurt you." Henry tugged at the ropes a little, hearing Peter bite back a wince and elbow him to stop him from moving. "I mean, let's be honest. It's about that girl, isn't it? The one you left for last time." Silence, and Johnny must have seen something he liked. Henry's stomach turned. "You went back for her last time, and yet... you still ended up here. Personally, I think  _this_  is your only friend. Not me, not the money, not the casino... this baby girl right here." Henry felt nausea and anger roil together in his stomach as Johnny's silhouette stepped closer to August, slowly circling him, the bag of drugs in his hand right in front of August's face.  _Stop it. Stop it, don't_. "She won't hurt you. She soothes all your troubles, she doesn't  _judge_  you."

"That's not..." August's voice vanished, a tone that Henry had only heard once or twice before... years ago. Before he left, back when he'd started his spiral downward... it was the tone of his willpower fading right before someone's eyes.  _No, goddammit, August, not after everything you've done_. Henry silently pled, barely managing to keep it to himself. Peter's hand had sped up, he could feel the rope beginning to loosen slightly. Just a little longer... "I didn't... come here for that..." August sounded unconvinced, distracted and wavering.

"Didn't you? Do you  _really_  want to go back for  _her?_  Booth, she's just gonna break your heart again. Hurt you all over again. You want to put yourself through that?" Henry's wrists twisted as he tried to free his hands, but Peter wasn't finished, and when a sharp pain lanced across his knuckles, it shocked him into inaction for a moment. What was he doing? He needed to think, but all he could see was  _red_. Johnny was  _luring_  him, and it was  _working_.

"Of course not... But the others... they need to go home." Henry's heart plunged into his stomach, and that nausea boiled up so quickly, he barely managed to swallow back down bile. August was giving in.

The rope snapped, and Peter yanked the frayed tassels away off of them. Before Henry realized what was happening, Peter had finished cutting the ropes around Henry's wrists, and had grabbed his chair. Henry stood, just as Peter pulled the curtain back and hurled the chair as hard as he could back at the guards at the door.

"What the hell!?" Johnny whirled, going for his gun, just as the other guard in the room did. Instinct and adrenaline in action, Henry grabbed his own chair and charged the other guard. With a sick thunk, he collided with the thug, pinning him to the wall with the chair, the back of it against his larynx.

" _Peter!_ You help him!  _Now!"_ Henry snarled, the adult command in his voice leaving no room for argument. Peter knew what to do, and with ease, the boy who had taken on Captain Hook more than once with the Lost Boys decked the guard in his grip, sending him reeling. Henry kept the pressure on, heart thudding, blood rushing in his ears as he tried to win against him in a fight that had quickly become for their lives. There was commotion behind him, but he was too busy forcing the guy down, even if he was a fairly reedy teen.

He heard his name from somewhere behind him, but he didn't want to stop. Henry bottled, just like someone else he knew. At least he had control over this right now.

"Henry, stop!" A firm hand on his shoulder pulled him away, and the guard slid to the floor, coughing. Before he could react, he'd been whirled around, and August was there, holding up the keys in his hand. "C'mon, we gotta go!" A furtive, but disoriented glance past August's shoulder revealed Johnny laid out on the floor, gun nowhere in sight. "Let's go, Henry! C'mon, buddy!" August grabbed him by the arm and tugged him in front, forcing him out the door before he could reply.

The trip from the casino to the hanger was an absolute blur. At some point, they spilled out onto the street, guards shouting after them in Thai as they piled into a car waiting. Bernard was driving and Bianca was babbling excitedly at them, then finding her phone and calling Wilbur to meet them at a location that Peter was spouting off.

All Henry could do was sit there and stew, trying to get the teenaged hormones under control that he didn't even really understand, or where the flare in his temper had come from. He'd been bottling up so long, trying to be the strong one for August, he'd pushed everything about him that wasn't a mature adult aside.

So, it shouldn't have surprised him when he finally got out of the car as they arrived at the hanger that the first thing he did was grab August by the shoulder and deck him hard as he could. With his injured hand.

Pain blossomed across his hand and he gasped in pain, shaking it out as he spun on his heel. Meanwhile, August staggered back a foot or two while he clutched at his jaw.

"You wooden  _jackass!_ " Henry shouted as he turned to face August, his voice pitching higher than he thought it would go as he borrowed one of  _many_  nicknames Peter had accumulated for him. "What the  _hell_  were you thinking?! You came there alone?! And he was your  _dealer?!_ Why didn't you tell me? Why didn't you tell  _any of us?!_ " Henry's vision blurred as he ranted and raved, teetering towards August as his hand dripped onto the ground from the cut of Peter's knife and the abuse of physical combat. "Do you have any idea what you almost  _did?_  Everything I've been through to  _get here?!_ " Tears started to streak down his face as he finally reached him again, grabbing the man by his shirt, shaking him like a toy. He knew that August could've stopped him, but he wasn't thinking about that. He was railing without a filter, enraged that his hero would have given in, disappointed that his _hero_  would have kept that secret from him. " _I need you, August! You're the only one who can help and you almost_ _ **threw it away, you idiot!**_ "

"Henry, Henry -" August's hands reached for his wrists, and the moment he touched him, Henry's anger melted away in a way he couldn't quite comprehend. It was... it was like his mom, but different. He buckled, and August pulled Henry's hands off his shirt, only to cup the boy's cheeks in his calloused palms, looking him in the eyes. "I am  _sorry_. I'm sorry, I should've told you about Johnny, but I am  _here,_ okay? I wasn't going to take the offer, okay? It's not worth it." The words sounded raw, sincere. Vulnerable and scared, just like Henry was underneath all the surface. "I'm sorry, I'm not gonna leave you again, kid, okay? I  _got_  it, I don't want to hurt you. Be mad at me all you want, but I'm not doing this for your mom. I'm doing it for  _you._ "

Henry's eyes searched August's for a moment, not sure what was happening, when the change had happened. But, it had. With that one statement, Henry was drained. He wrapped his arms around the other man. He got it now.

He hadn't been searching for his hero.

He'd been searching for this...


	6. The Tough Guy Crumbles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After successfully rescuing August from his demons in Phuket, the group finally reaches Storybrooke. But is August ready to face the past, the present and the terrifying future all at once?

There had been a time when the roar of August's bike simultaneously soothed and excited him. A time when the road was a path to bliss: A single-minded focus that left every problem he'd ever had in the dust, swallowed by the sensation of the powerful machine beneath him and the smell of asphalt and exhaust. He could forget everything but the journey, not caring about the next destination.

But, not this time.

The moment they'd arrived in Phoenix, August's conviction to go back to Storybrooke, to see Emma, had buckled again. What a pattern of behavior to have. The moment he told himself he was going to make good on his promises, fix things for Emma, for  _Henry_ , obstacles just reared their ugly heads. The fear of the unknown, of all the ways he knew he would punish himself, and how much worse it would be when Emma was the one disappointed and angry with him... it all made him waver and teeter precariously towards running away. Again.

In the end, it was the way they bid their goodbyes to Bianca, Bernard and Wilbur that reinforced it for him. He hadn't expected that they would part ways so soon, although he shouldn't have been surprised. They'd rescued him from Hawhna's debt, from the pit of empty, hedonistic numbness that had been his existence in Phuket. They seemed like they would have continued on this journey.

" _If you need anything when you get back from Storybrooke, please, don't hesitate to call."_  Bianca had said with another sympathetic hug as they waited for a cab to pick them up at the airport. _"But, we cannot come with you. We tried. Even with Henry and Peter's guidance, we... we couldn't find the town. Whatever is happening with your family, I am afraid we cannot help you further."_

It drove his resolve home. Storybrooke was off the map again. After the curse had broken, after he'd left, the town had shown up on maps, on internet searches, on normal portals of information. People just didn't  _go_  to Storybrooke, but they could if they  _really_  wanted to.

That meant there really  _was_  no one else who could help. If Neal had remained in Storybrooke - and August had no reason to assume he hadn't - then the only person who knew about magic and wasn't in town was... well... August.

It had been a blessing that Henry had made sure August got his bike back. It gave August something to center on, at first. Of course, he could not have expected the surge of pride and embarrassment he felt when Henry revealed a second bike, also stored in the storage locker - not nearly as dusty as his, though, and royal blue paint where August's was black. It belonged to the youngest of the Charming family.

August had actually been rendered speechless.

Henry had somehow gotten his hands on the same model bike, painted to match his own style, and... he remembered how to take care of it. Not only that, he'd begun to teach Peter the same thing.

Memories of August teaching a twelve-year-old Henry how to work on a motorcycle ran through his head during the entire three-day trip from Phoenix, Arizona to Storybrooke, Maine. Surprisingly, it kept his demons at bay. For now.

As they finally rolled past the town line, a small motorcycle gang of three, the weight of August's wooden leg suddenly began to feel like an emotional shackle, tethering him back to the prison of his own failures. His stormy eyes scanned the road ahead as they approached the town. He seemed calm on the outside, but there was something profoundly amiss.

Henry pulled his bike up to a stop with practiced ease just outside an ornate, well-built mansion. One that August knew all too well...

As August parked his bike beside Henry's and swung his wooden leg over, he unsnapped his helmet and pulled it off, eyes glued to the home. "Henry, what're we doing here?" He dropped the kickstand and rested his vehicle comfortably. Swallowing, he stepped around them to the main driveway, hanging his helmet on his handlebar. The number 316 on the brick exterior wall reminded him of the last time he'd been here. The only time he'd been here.

Henry didn't reply, he just darted up the stairs before opening the door with no ceremony whatsoever. August opened his mouth to protest, but before he could, he caught a flash of ginger beside him, a stark contrast to the grey skies.

"There's someone we - he needs to see," Was all Peter would offer before he, too, headed into the house.

August watched him go, confusion plain on his features. Unless Emma was at Jefferson's, which made  _absolutely_  no sense to him, then they were there about someone else. But, who?

Before he could talk himself out of it, August's footfalls fell in behind Peter.

The house itself was silent, save for the occasional creak of wood. His nerves on high alert, he half-expected Jefferson to come barreling out from one of the rooms. They'd long since gone past the initial antagonism and worry he'd felt in regards to the Hatter, but it didn't change that they'd just walked into his house, and Peter was climbing the stairs to the second floor as if it was his own home. This was  _wrong._ Just how much had changed in five years?

As he reached the top of the stairs and watched Peter disappear into one of the bedrooms, the anxiety he felt only intensified as, yet again, there was no Jefferson waiting there. Where  _was_  he?

August took a tentative step forward as he heard Henry's voice in hushed tones, presumably from that bedroom Peter was in as well. What was the point of all this? Why were they here?

"Hey, Grace." Peter's voice. Henry stopped talking the moment his friend joined him. So, that's what this was about? Jefferson's daughter? August had only met her a handful of times. He vaguely recalled that Henry went to school with her, used to be known as Paige. "I'm guessing Henry told you. We found him."

"We're gonna fix this, Grace." Henry again, and August felt that anxiety turn to weight, a sinking weight that told him whatever was on the other side of that doorway... it was enough to make Henry's voice quiver like a child all over again. "I mean, we're still okay. And so's August. I think this is it, I think Grandpa's right. We can get you back..."

Get her back?

August's feet moved of their own volition, and he made it around the corner, into the bedroom doorway.

He stopped cold.

Grace's room looked like that of any other sixteen year old. Jefferson's house had always had a very Baroque feel, but this room was painted in baby blues and whites. There were posters, knick-knacks and china dolls about the room, an immaculate desk, and a dresser that was open at one drawer, a shirt hanging out of it. But it looked like it hadn't been disturbed in a very,  _very_  long time.

With all of that, what drew his gaze was the worn stuffed rabbit, perched in the corner of the room, nestled between a pillow and the wall. It seemed so serene, and ever-watchful, its dark eyes downcast in the direction of the figure tucked into the covers.

Grace had long, flowing hair the color of dark straw once, and eyes with a gentle cat's eye shape that always made her look inquisitive. But, it was her smile August had remembered. The way she lit up whenever she saw her father, or Henry...

There was no smile. Her features were placid, eyes closed, lips parted. She wasn't a girl anymore. She was a young woman, just like Henry had become a young man.

But, even all of that wasn't what made August's feet freeze in place, his heart cutting off his throat, head spinning.

It was that the woman in the bed possessed no flesh and blood.

She was made of marble.

As if she'd been crafted by a sculptor of the Renaissance, every detail had been etched into the alabaster stone before him. And like any other statue, there was no movement, no semblance of life. August's breath remained trapped in his chest as his eyes refused to move from her face. It was all too haunting to see something so similar to what he had once looked like...

And yet, Henry sat at the edge of the bed, his finger running along her cheek as he muttered to her quietly. Peter was on the other side of him, a hand on the boy's shoulder. His other hand caressed a white, slender hand as it rested on her stomach.

The tableau itself shouldn't have sent such an ache through August, but it was something he couldn't quite name. He hadn't been here for Henry. He hadn't been here while he'd clearly grown close to this girl. Peter, too. He didn't understand what exactly was going on, but he felt like he shouldn't have been there.

"Henry, mind telling me what's going on?"

Haunted eyes gazed back at the older, more broken man, but suddenly, his pain seemed pale in comparison. The younger boy was holding sorrow at bay, enough sorrow to make August buckle under the emotional weight. "This is Grace, August." Henry muttered quietly, casting a sad glance her way. Peter's hand squeezed on his shoulder, and the motion spurred the two on until they stood. "Um... she was one of the last to go." Henry swallowed thickly, the finality in his statement oddly contrasted with a note of hope. "I just wanted to see her. We can go."

Henry made his way towards the door, clearly moving to brush past August with ease. The man's arm shot out, his hand clasping Henry's shoulder firmly, trying to make eye contact. " **Henry**. You need to tell me what happened here."

Tension passed between them, there was a flicker as Henry tried to meet his gaze, but couldn't. Outside, the sun sank, casting vibrant hues of red and orange in the otherwise sedate room.

Henry shook off the grip and continued out into the hallway, then down the steps.

Confused, frustrated, and even more worried than before, August shot another glance at Peter, who simply shrugged and moved on. No answers, just a chilling atmosphere of loss and pain.

Grace's frozen visage haunted August's thoughts as they made their way into the town proper, the bikes a distinct rumble shattering the false serenity of Storybrooke's back streets. Unfortunately, as a wordsmith, his mind was teeming with any possible explanation for what he had seen. None of them were worth settling on, given that he had no information from the boys, and he was reluctant to press them. He knew the value of keeping secrets. It had been something he and Henry had initially bonded over: the secret of the Curse.

But, this didn't feel like a curse of life without magic. This felt like...  _death._

August was torn between wanting to respect Henry's obvious reluctance to explain the situation now that he was beginning to get an inkling of the stakes, and wanting to shake it out of him. He didn't want Henry carrying whatever weight this was alone. He knew the burden of guilt and terror, of secrets no one would ever believe.

He really should've kept his eyes on the road.

As August's gaze skimmed the horizon, the trees rushing past them, he saw it. His fingers squeezed the brake before he could tell himself not to, and his bike came to screeching halt. One boot went down to steady himself, but nothing could stop the pounding in his chest as he stared at it...

_Home._

The sun finally slipped into the darkness as August remained frozen to his bike. The garage door was still closed, no light peeking out of windows, or from cracks in the seals of doorways. His heart kept crawling up to his throat, his chest was tight, strangling him as if he was turning to wood all over again.

This was a town of ghosts for August, but not the same spectres that haunted Peter and Henry.

_The crowbar swung with a resounding crack, the splintering of wood planks music to the drunken ears of the son of a woodworker. The tools of his father's craft split before him as he rose the bar and swung again, destroying the jewelry box they had been working on for Emma's birthday._

_Emma..._

_A small voice in the back of his head told him to stop. She would know._

_He swung again, watching through bleary blue orbs as the box toppled over. Again and again, he dashed the precious work to bits, unaware of the soundtrack he was punctuating with choked grunts and destruction._

_August staggered as his head swam, and he forced his chin up, the crowbar dangling from his right hand as he looked around at the culmination of his father's life. Cursed... not cursed... all of it was there. August found the whale his father had carved for him, still perched on that damned shelf._

_His equilibrium pitched again, and he grabbed the plank. With a guttural cry, grief drove the man to pull the shelf from its fastenings. The whale, the lamp with its haphazard shade, the eagle carved so lovingly, it all went toppling down to the ground, skittering across the concrete._

_But, it still hurt. The grief still tore at every synapse, every fiber, every raw nerve of his body._

_August blinked back tears as he grabbed for the bottle of Jack that had somehow made it with him, downing another long, scorching gulp to try to drown the pain._

_Coughing and choking, he barely slid the bottle back onto a counter and wiped his mouth, chest heaving._

_His father's life was here._

_His father was supposed to have a life here._ _**With him.** _

_August's sights settled on the greatest of all his father's works, the one he had helped him repair time and time again. He had painted and stained each shingle, each panel. The cuckoo clock had been his father's tools to teach the boy who had become a disappointment of a man._

_And now his father was gone._

_His father would never paint another shingle, he would never tell August how proud he was of 'his boy.' His... worthless,_ _**spineless** _ _boy who couldn't be there when he needed him most. His "boy" who had been given a momentary glimpse into what it felt like to be innocent again, only for his old life to come crashing down. His father had even lost the chance to raise him again. He couldn't even have_ _**that** _ _memory to soothe him as he faded away._

_**His father was gone.** _

_Pain constricted in August's chest, the bone-numbing terror at the loss of the man, the strangling grief overwhelming him again as he bit back a sob._

_The crow bar smashed through the tower of the cuckoo clock without hesitation, sending fragments of wood everywhere, the innards of the clock exposed for all to see. The bliss of sheer destruction, of the enraged pounding of metal upon the gearwork, the wooden frame, it consumed August as he decimated it. Over and over again, he swung the crowbar, both hands clutching the surface even as his hands grew slick from sweat. But, he didn't stop._

_Each blow, he saw his father's eyes. Each blow, he thought of the years he'd wasted. Each blow, he saw his father's smile and felt the embraces of the last two years. Each blow, he saw Victor's face as he tried to explain to August that his father was just... gone. Each blow, August felt his body crumple all over again, untethered._

_He'd_ _**found** _ _him, he'd finally_ _**done right by his father** _ _, and now he was gone_ _**forever** _ _._

_August screamed in wordless grief and rage as he threw the crowbar as hard as he could, watching as it smashed into the fuse box. Glass popped, lights flickered, and suddenly, he was alone._

_Alone in darkness._

_The newly orphaned son of a woodworker fell to his knees, hands trying to catch him by using the table, but all he did was take the remainder of the clock with him._

_He failed everything and everyone he cared about._

_And now he couldn't even be the son of a woodworker. He'd made sure of that._

"August?"

He blinked at the sound of his own name, a tear slipping down his cheek before he could stop it. He cleared his throat and reached up to brush it away with a gloved hand before turning to Henry and Peter, who were waiting for him. Henry's expression was still that same mask to hide his pain, but Peter... Peter looked at August with something akin to fear. As if he didn't want to think about that pain. What it might mean to him, what August was going through just being near his father's shop.

August didn't want to think about it himself.

With a smooth movement, he revved the bike back up and took off down the street to follow them.

The next destination was much closer than August had assumed it would be. He wasn't sure why he'd assumed they were on some great journey around town, but maybe it was just a selfish desire. He wanted to be left to his thoughts, just for a little while, and the purring of his engine barely kept the rushing tide of grief from knocking him on his ass. Already, he found himself itching at the inside of his elbow, the shakes following right behind.

Never was he more thankful to pull his bike up and set his feet on solid ground. He might have stepped foot in Storybrooke, but his very veins still craved Phuket, even if he knew he wouldn't go back. Seeing how quickly Henry had been to assume he would fall back into old patterns... August knew that even if his body was craving the numbness, he didn't - he  _couldn't_  do that again. His convictions were stronger than that. When August fell from grace, he did so spectacularly. He had no desire to do that now.

Although, once he had a chance to hook his helmet onto his handlebars and glance up at the house before him, that conviction of his shook once more. He hadn't known Jefferson too well, and seeing what had become of his daughter was bad enough.

But... this was Mary Margaret -  _Snow's_  loft.

It didn't matter that he hadn't seen Emma's parents in five years, that he hadn't seen  _Emma_  in five years. It didn't matter that every time her face flickered behind his eyes, all he could think of was all the mistakes he'd made, all the ways he'd hurt her, hurt everyone.

Suddenly, all he could think about was what he was going to find inside that little safe haven the royal family had carved for themselves. _What had_ _ **happened**_ _here in Storybrooke?_

August's feet moved before his mind caught up with the action. He wasn't sure what was propelling him. It wasn't Henry or Peter, they were now trailing behind him as he ran inside, taking the steps up to the loft two, three at a time.

"August, hold up!" Henry's voice barely registered as August made it to the front door, trying to open it. He heard the boy sidle up to him, but confusion and worry was obvious in his tone. It made August's stomach turn sour as he tried the doorknob again, then shoved it. "It's locked? It shouldn't be locked - "

By this point, adrenaline had taken over. The moment the words  _shouldn't_ and  _locked_  had left Henry's lips, August's masterful ability to just work on impulse had taken over. If Emma was on the other side of that door... if she was like Grace... If he'd let her down again...

August's shoulder hit the door with all the force of a mack truck, and it shot open as he heard wood splinter painfully. The ornate lock he had built for Emma and her family went spinning across the pergo floor, but he paid it no mind as he and Henry spilled through the doorway into the living room.

It was quiet. Eerily so.

All he could hear was his own ragged breathing as he tried not to panic. A curtain that he didn't remember ever separating the bed and the kitchen fluttered in a breeze from an open window on the other side. August's fists clenched and unclenched as he looked around, another heavy, uneven step taking him further into the room as he scanned the scene.

"Emma?" August called out, the sound frantic, reminding him of a time years ago, in the Sheriff's office, where he'd been searching for her then.  _And he'd failed her then, too..._  " _ **Emma!**_ " He shouted louder, muffling a curse as his wooden leg didn't catch up with the rest of him and he stumbled, nearly toppling over. He grabbed for the kitchen counter for support, wincing and trying to pivot around so he could keep seeking her out.

"She's not here..."

The abused, rough voice came from behind the curtain near the bed. Harsh, but soft and...  _sick_. But, August knew that voice. He'd heard it all too many times in Storybrooke.

August turned and made his way towards the curtain. He saw the silhouettes of figures before he pulled the fragile, white polyester back. Fear and trepidation at what was on the other side finally gave way...

Not from relief. But, from the cold reality that lay before them. August's eyes would be haunted for a long time with it.

Leroy, he noticed first.

The normally dour dwarf was closest to the headboard, bent over and sorrowful. But... he wasn't moving. He was stone.  _Just like Grace_.

Grief-stricken, he was only the leader of the frozen row of dwarves around one side of the bed. Each of them, faces contorted and frozen in sobs, were the vanguard, lone sentinels for an elegant figure meticulously tucked into the covers. But, it was no China doll.

August's legs threatened to give out.

"Snow White..." He whispered, only vaguely aware of Henry walking past him again. He felt a hand on his shoulder, and August jumped, forcing his legs to straighten. As much as he couldn't even begin to process the mystery before him, he needed the gentle reminder that he _had_  to be strong, for Henry, for Emma, and hell, for Peter.

But what was happening? What had happened to Storybrooke?

"I told Henry to make sure she stayed away..." That abused voice again. It finally reached August's ears, but more importantly, his synapses, because he immediately tore his eyes away from Snow's deceptively serene expression to face the only person beside her on the bed.

August had seen many a painting or picture of old men dying in their four-post beds, all bones and skin and grey hair. And he had known there would be a time when his father would die, as raw and strangling as that grief still was.

But he had no frame of reference for the sight of David, Emma's  _father_ , the  _King_ , sitting up on his side of the bed, clad in his jeans and a worn plaid shirt, one hand on his chest, the other... that same ivory color as marble fingers laced together.

An absent reminder of what his time right before the curse was broken had been like. That slow fading. That knowledge that his body was turning on him. That his only companions became the silence and his regrets.

"Grandpa..." Henry's whisper split August's heart right in two, and ungainly as he was, as broken and ruined by drugs and alcohol as he was, he still forced himself to walk over to that side of the bed. Henry was now crouched down next to his grandfather, in that age of being too tall for anything, but David just smiled and glanced over at the boy.

August swallowed as he awkwardly reached the duo, and he looked the king - the man he once thought would be his father-in-law - over. "David..." The pity, perplexed worry, all of it just seeped right through August's tone. "What happened here? Are you..." August's throat closed up all on its own, and he swallowed to try to force more dialogue.

"I'm dying..." David breathed, his chest rising slowly. As the boys looked on, August's jaw shook slightly as that marble quality began to crawl up David's hand on his chest.

"Grandpa, don't say that." Henry pled, those walls he'd kept up most of the trip finally coming down. The quiet desperation in his voice was nothing like the bombastic anger he'd expressed in Phuket. This was raw terror all encapsulated in just a few words. "I got August, just like you asked. We're gonna be able to fix this now."

"Peter..." David tapped a weak finger against of the snaps on his shirt, but Peter took that as a signal to come closer. "Take Henry..." Another ragged breath, his hand was now white to his knuckles. "Outside. I need to speak to August... alone..."

"No, nono, Grandpa, you can't cut me out of this - " Henry shrugged off Peter's hand on his elbow, gearing up for a fight just like August had those years before when he'd lost his own father.

He wasn't worth much for Henry, but August was determined to do what he could. Reaching out, he rested his hand on Henry's chest, gently guiding him back towards Peter. "Henry, just gimme a minute with him, okay?" The younger boy's eyes darted everywhere but August's, not wanting to meet his gaze for whatever reason. But, he knew that if David had a reason to keep information from Henry, he had to face that and respect his wishes. "I promise, it won't take long."

"C'mon, Henry..." Peter softly urged, hoping to break the tension between all of them.

Henry's eyes met August's with an eerie sense of familiarity, as if he'd been seeing those same hues in the mirror every day. But, the boy backed down. Swallowing thickly, Henry dropped his glance to the floor and nodded. "Okay... just... he's  _not_  dying." It was as much an affirmation as it was a plea for August to intervene on the man's behalf. "He's  _not._ "

As Henry left, August wanted to have the right words to console him. He hadn't been there for Henry.  _At all._  And it was abundantly clear that whatever had happened to Grace had taken over the town like a rash, immobilizing and slowly suffocating everyone Henry had ever met or cared about.

"Mister Booth..." David's voice was casual and surprisingly lighthearted, as if he was greeting him on the street after a date with his daughter. Not like he was the man David had unceremoniously slugged out of a bar while August was busy self-destructing.

Even as he turned and walked back over to Emma's father, pulling up a chair so he could sit level with him, August knew that it didn't matter how much David was pained, dying... he was still the only patriarch August had ever respected as much as his own father. It was difficult to keep the emotion from swallowing his words as he asked the question he really wished he didn't have to. "I don't know what's happening to you. Why would you want to see me?"

"August..." David turned to face August with a slight shift of his head, but as his brow knit with pain, he had to wonder just what had already turned to marble. "Storybrooke... it's all like this." The older man swallowed, eyes crinkling in quiet agony. "We lost Gold before... he knew what had happened. But you're all we have left, August... I need you..." David's fingers curled and caught on the rough fabric of the neglected plaid shirt. "To protect my family. Something... is stealing magic. And it's stealing everything..." David's breathing grew more labored, his voice nearly vanished. As August leaned closer, to help lessen the other man's pain as best he could, he was shaken to his core as that marble color overtook David's fingers and began to climb up his neck. August had heard Emma's accounts of what it had been like to watch him turn to wood. And what cruel twist of fate it was that he was watching it happen. To everyone. David's lips moved, but he couldn't make a sound, and August leaned ever closer, his ear almost to the older man's lips.

"Find her, August... it's..." David wheezed, and his lips shuddered. "Coming... for her..."

The warning bathed August in cold terror. "What's coming?" He barely managed to force the words. No answer. He must have been getting weaker. "David, what..." He pulled back, turning to face him. "What's coming for her..." The last word died on his lips.

David's face was frozen, marble, hollow eyes staring back at him.

Emma's father, Snow's husband, the King...

Was gone.

August backpedaled out of the seat so fast he knocked over the chair, a disgusted, terrified whimper ripping from his throat. The commotion must have broken whatever tenuous hold Peter had on his friend, as August heard Henry rushing back in as if underwater. The shock washed over him, but he forced it back, somehow - miraculously - grabbing Henry and pulling him into a hug tighter than before. "No, Henry..." He choked out, walking the boy out of the room even as he heard the cries for his family. "He's gone..." August held him tighter. "We gotta find your mother..."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was going to publish this after August Appreciation Week on tumblr, but since it's got such heavy Henry/August moments, I wanted to consider it a contribution. I'll be busy much of the weekend, so I don't know if I'll have a chance to really do more, but everyone knows that I find August and Henry's relationship to be one of the most fascinating aspects of their characters, and has been a huge component of Threading Pages. So, enjoy! Read, review, that kind of thing. Give me loves, or in this case, demand that I pay for your therapy bills at what I did to everyone in this chapter.


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